Six Months Dark
by DiggyDelena
Summary: He felt like every day for those past six months he'd been holding his breath, waiting for something to happen, her voice to reappear, or his heart to suffocate and pull him out of this misery he'd been in. Auggie felt like every single second he'd been holding his breath, and that moment, this moment, after hearing that voice, he finally let out the air he'd much been needing.
1. Part I

**empty**: (_adjective_) containing nothing; not filled or occupied; lacking meaning or sincerity; having no value or purpose. Synonyms: meaningless, hollow, vacant, deserted, or _abandoned._

_Auggie Anderson had gone from a full life, to feeling completely, and utterly empty._

* * *

**Part I**

It had been almost six months since she died. The memories of their last few seconds together still replayed in his mind every minute like a song stuck on repeat. Except that it wasn't a song he heard in his memories, it was that last goodbye, the ding of elevator doors opening, and then the earth-shattering boom of shots being fired. The last thing he heard was an echoing thud as a body fell, and then all went down in silence, and he never saw her again.

The day after it happened, Joan called Auggie from her hospital. She was out at her own medical facility with problems during her pregnancy when she got the news. She had to be the one to tell him personally, and so she called him out of his office where he was doing anything but work, brought him to her hospital room where he looked like the walking dead, and finally told him _she was gone._

His first stage of grief was denial. He didn't believe the news. He hadn't believe all the drones that had infiltrated the DPD about her death and he didn't want to believe Joan either. Annie Walker could _not _be dead. It was simply unimaginable. She could not have died like that and just left him to pick up the broken shards of his shattered life without her. He done anything and everything he could for her. He'd ruined his own life to help her. When they told him she was dead, he denied the possibility. This could _not_ have all been for nothing. He'd never admitted to anyone before that being taken care of would not be the worst thing in life, yet he couldn't reciprocate the notion to the only person he admitted it to because she was dead, and he wouldn't accept the fact.

Six weeks after that call, her body arrived in a jar of ashes at the DPD. No stars were installed on their wall of heroes for a rogue agent, and no recognition was given to a fallen _traitor._ Only his tech personnel offered any reassurance behind closed doors, and the second stage of Auggie's grief was anger.

He was angry at Annie for charging into her own demise knowing full well she didn't have much of a hope of coming back to him. He was mad at Henry Wilcox while not being the one who physically pulled the trigger, being the one who forced her into the position she was in when she died. Finally, he was most angry at himself, for not being able to stop her before it was too late. He should have stopped her from going after Calder Michaels after Teo died and Henry Wilcox got away with murder to spend another day doing his devious deeds. He should have asked her to come home that day on the payphone when she was at the train station. He should have stopped her from following Teo when Arthur and Joan brought it up a few days earlier. He should have stopped her from pursuing Henry Wilcox after she unintentionally made a deal with the devil in exchange for DNA results with the FBI. He should have stopped her from ever going into Seth Newman's house to do their own investigating so she'd never be put into a position of requiring Henry Wilcox's services in the first place. He should have kept her safe, kept her home, and figured out another way to get back at Wilcox that didn't father these series of events that lead up to Annie Walker coming home in a jar of ashes. He should have told her the truth about how he needed her in his life a long time before the words were ever heard.

He loved her. He loved her so much and for so long already, the beginning of these feelings was a fuzzy grey area in his heart. Part of him thought he always loved her, at least a little bit. Yet, he waited until she was knocking on death's door to admit the fact fully, and that was what he was most angry about. He lost her, like he'd thought he'd lost his ex wife years ago, yet he was certain he loved Annie Walker more than he ever thought he loved Helen.

The third stage of grief, and the current stage Auggie Anderson waded through six months after Annie Walker's ashes returned to DC was depression, and unlike the dark curse that haunted him after he lost his sight, he didn't have any will to try and fight it off this time.

**SIX MONTHS LATER**

Auggie Anderson sat at his desk with a mountain of papers on his right, a bowl of USB drives on his left, and a cacophony of buzzing, beeping, and ringing equipment surrounding him. He couldn't see any of it, but at this point in his existence as he stared off blindly into an inexistent space in front of him, he didn't really hear or feel or taste or smell anything either. He simply existed in this nebulous of life, without a sole purpose or meaning or wish or dream, an empty shell counting off the days until someone would shoot him in his sleep or hit him as he crossed the road or drugged him when he wasn't paying attention. Anything to simply end the endless days of absence in his life. He was empty, alone, meaningless, abandoned.

"Auggie," someone called his name cautiously as a hand touched his shoulder. He did not even flinch at the touch or the sound.

"Auggie," Eric Barber repeated his name after not getting a response from his blind superior. "Joan's been trying to call you into her office all day. You need to go, man. I have to take you to her."

In complete silence, Auggie let his co-worker lead him to _his_ superior's door. He was so silent and absent as he walked down those invisible halls, it was all a haze to him. Somewhere beside him, he knew Eric said something, probably words of encouragement, but Auggie didn't register them. He was pretty sure he heard voices as he passed countless desks and open doorways, but he was oblivious to them, lost in his own thoughts, lost in his own depression.

"Auggie," someone snapped finally pulling him from his painful thoughts. He blinked, once, twice, his mind whirring slightly as he tried to place himself. _Was he still in the hall? Was he already at Joan's? Whose voice had just called him?_

"Auggie," a female voice repeated. This time he could pinpoint its origin.

"Joan," he replied in a similar, falsified professional tone. He didn't have any emotion from her. He didn't even have words for her. He didn't feel like he had much of anything anymore.

"I hear you haven't been going to your mandated therapy."

Auggie remained silent. His body language was cold and unmoving, but his eyes, which Joan's vision was currently locked on was vacant and unmoved. It was like he was dead inside.

"You know that I would do what I can to support you Auggie, but this has grown into something out of my control." The poised, slightly older woman recited the words with an authority no one could question, but the look in her blue eyes, the look invisible to the blind man before her, gave away more emotion than anyone so high up in clandestine services would ever dare admit. "Its obvious," she paused as she swallowed back the difficult words. "That you have become nearly useless at the DPD."

"So you're firing me." They were the first four words other than her name that Joan had heard from the blind tech's mouth in almost a month, and those words seemed to cut through her like a hot iron.

"I think you should consider taking an extended leave of absence, Auggie." She breathed out heavily. The words had been spoken, her thoughts made clear and the deed was done.

"If you're going to fire me Joan, fire me," he spoke gruffly. Auggie began turning in his spot, oblivious to where in the room he even was as he prepared to take a step out. "Otherwise I'm getting back to wor…" he was halfway through the last syllable in the sentence when his legs suddenly collided with something hard and very heavy.

"You're not fit for duty in your current state. Not even desk duty."

"The hell I am," he argued gruffly as his hands scanned the object in his path. It felt like a dresser, or maybe an old wooden file cabinet, but he wasn't sure he even knew if either of those things were in Joan's office. _Were_ they even in Joan's office?

"Do you even know what part of my office you are currently _in, _Auggie?" Auggie's reply was a gruff and mumbled remark. He sidestepped the obstruction before him and attempted to navigate the remainder of the way to the door, but came up to a flat wall and cursed loudly. Even if Joan's face remained unchanged, the scene in front of her pulled something inside of her chest with a painful twist. "You need to go home, Auggie. I'm giving you three weeks off to figure out if you want to take that leave of absence or not. If you come back then and are still in the same state, harsher actions will be taken. Do I make myself clear?"

He wanted to close his eyes, but it wouldn't have made a difference anyways. Eyelids did nothing to block out _sound._ He was just so tired of it all. He was tired of _not_ hearing how Annie died nobly as in the case of all his past fallen colleagues. He was tired of any mention of her being blacklisted because she was a rogue operative who committed treason. He was tired of everyone's whispers and hushes around him, as if his blindness and heartbreak made him deaf too. He was tired of waiting, hoping, praying and dreaming that she'd show up at his door one day, or call him on his phone one morning, or wake up in his bed one evening. He was tired of waiting for some sign that something _was_ amiss, and tired of never finding the answer. He was tired of having hope that went unanswered because _she was dead_ and he couldn't accept the fact. _Annie Walker is dead._

"Crystal," was his only reply.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Part one of what I hope will be a 3-part fic. This will also be the shortest part since its more of an intro than anything else. I have many thanks to give including Epona3 aka LovetoLoveher80 for the encouragement to write this, and paixnouvelle for many spectacular ideas and plot bunnies.

As always, your feedback and reviews are great inspiration, so I'd love to read your thoughts.

-Liz


	2. Part II

**Part II**

**2 Weeks Later**

"Auggie!" Someone thumped heavily against the sliding metal doorway of Auggie Anderson's studio style apartment. Deep inside the one-room living area, the blind man lay in the middle of his bed. His hair was sticking to his oily skin in a matted array, his skin was a pasty pale tone as if he had avoided the outdoors in weeks, and his sweaty clothes stuck to his skin like he hadn't bathed in a few days. Passed out with one arm extended beneath him and the other dangling off the edge of the mattress, his barely audible snoring and light moisture building around the spot his slept on let out the obvious red flags that he was neither sleeping peacefully, nor for very long.

"Ok man, your door is unlocked so I'm just going to let myself in now…" The much larger tech sounded off carefully as the heavy metal door began sliding carefully open. Eric Barber carefully poked one head into the apartment and cringed a little. The AC wasn't on, the window were closed, the apartment was still torn apart from the sweep _months_ ago, and by the looks of it, Auggie had stopped paying his cleaning ladies months ago too. "Oh man," he muttered loudly as he finally stepped inside the once impressive apartment.

"Auggie," he half shouted in the apartment. From feet away, Auggie's sightless eyes finally snapped open. His blind brown irises scanned around for a moment, like he almost always did when abruptly awoken, before calming down and setting on nothing in particular.

"Man, you're a mess," Eric's voice reached Auggie's sensitive ears as the bigger man finally spotted and turned to the direction of his colleague and once superior. He took a step closer to the bedroom part of the studio and frowned at the mess he saw of this man he'd once considered a friend. "I brought you a coffee," he said slowly as he watched Auggie stiffly raise himself from his disheveled bed. "Which by the looks of it I probably should have brought you some aspirin too." It was painfully obvious from the odor, appearance, and empty bottle beside his bed that Auggie Anderson had been drinking, and not lightly either.

"Joan sent you to babysit me." It wasn't a question, but a statement and spot-on observation that the blind man croaked as he attempted to navigate to the restroom.

"I want to lie to you and make up some other reason for being here, but by the looks of it, she had every instinct _right_ to send someone to check up on you."

"Get out, Eric," Auggie yelled gruffly from behind a closed door of the bathroom.

"If Joan finds out I left you in the current mess you're in right now, she's going to demote me so low, I'll be working below the mail room. She already knows all the off-the-book things we ran for you before..." The man's voice trailed off. _Before Annie died._

"Then do whatever you need to do to convince Joan I can come back to work in a week and leave."

Eric didn't say anything else for a moment as he silently scanned the room. As a tech, agent Barber had not had all the same extensive training as a field operative. Nonetheless, anyone who worked for or in the CIA did have to have many training skills fine-tuned before they even got to be briefed on the inner workings of clandestine services. At the moment that he had stepped into the torn apartment, all those training tips and skills started to kick in, an unpleasant picture was forming inside the tech's head. "Can I ask you something?"

Auggie wanted to roll his eyes, but with the pulsing that was emitting behind them at the moment, and the uncertainty of whether or not Eric was even facing him, he didn't bother. "Do I have a choice?"

"I heard that when you had your accident you were a suicide risk for some time." The room grew deathly silent. "Is that true?"

Auggie remained silent, his cold, empty expression unmoving, but it was answer enough.

"You know you're not alone, Man. There are people out there for you…"

"If you want to make yourself useful, you can dig through my mail and tell me if there's anything important in it," Auggie interrupted the other man roughly. "I haven't gotten around to scanning any of it to read it.

Eric made a noise that was muffled in his shuffle back to the impressively sized box of papers and envelopes beside the apartment's front door. An uncomfortable silence fell in the apartment then, only broken by Auggie's stumble over a discarded item in his path to the kitchen area, and the string of cursing that erupted from his mouth the next instant.

The other tech frowned as he glanced up from rummaging through nearly six months of letter, bills, advertisements and flyers. He watched with a look he'd never admit as pity as Auggie stumbled to brew himself a pot of coffee.

"Oh, I brought you a coffee and a muffin on the way here. It's at your island." Auggie didn't verbally respond to his guest's gift, but his guest also didn't need one. From back at the apartment's couch and coffee table, Eric Barber watched his friend take a first tentative sip of the hot sustenance and close his eyes for a moment as it seeped into his dry and sore throat. Eric was grateful to see the tiny glimpse of peace as Auggie enjoyed the coffee, but the moment was also bittersweet.

For months rumors had spread throughout Langley of a romance between the late Annie Walker and the currently on-leave Auggie Anderson. Just a few weeks before her death, Eric Barber, finally asked Auggie about his relationship with the stunning operative, only to be left with more questions than answers.

And then he heard the live feed of Annie Walker's last transmission. He remembered hearing Auggie's voice on one end of the line, and Annie's on the other as nearly all of the DPD listened in on their phone conversation. Watching her in that elevator, the dark looming fear of what was to come seeping into his mind, he felt like part of his own heart was being sacrificed as he thought about what was about to happen to his blind friend more than anything else. Then those three unpredicted words seeped out between them, the words that confirmed all of his suspicions, and it tore through him even deeper than he had expected. It was a wonder than this tortured man before him now was even as functional as he still was after everything that had happened to him before and since that horrific night. Taking the verbal abuse and lending his eyes for a few hours to help with such a mundane activity as sorting mail, was the least he could do to offer assistance to someone who rejected even the notion of it.

Auggie grunted something from across the room about the mail and it successfully snapped the other tech op's attention back to the impressive pile before him.

"Anything in particular I should be looking for?" Eric asked after a few minutes as he inspected what appeared to be about a dozen electric bills, two notices from the apartment complex's owner, and what seemed to be a very strange amount of advertisements, flyers and catalogues.

"Mail," Auggie replied coldly without much thought, but his guest did not take offense as he continued inspecting the strange medley of papers before him.

"Hey, maybe you should adopt a dog," Eric's voice popped up amidst the sound of flipping papers and cards. Auggie raised an eyebrow at the strange outburst but didn't answer; luckily, Eric was watching the blind man and caught his look of confusion. "You have a few advertisements here about lost dogs being found and needing new homes."

Auggie felt a strange string of thoughts fluttering through his mind, like there were memories and thoughts in head trying to connect but not quite catching in his hangover-muddled brain.

"Do you like collies or something?"

And then it caught. The thoughts made sense.

_Found: One Female Collie. House-trained. Not Spayed. Contact E._

Auggie's attention abruptly snapped, and he stood up from his slouched over spot so quickly, there was an audible pop in his spine as his sore body fussed over his movement.

"Eric, I need you to leave," Auggie said loudly. Eric glanced his way with a strange expression on his face, and noticed immediately that Auggie had a look that didn't fit his words. Eric was ready to refuse when Auggie cut him off abruptly. "_Now._"

"What?" Eric began questioning as he looked up to his sightless co-worker.

"Now!" Auggie reiterated. Eric stood, moving everything he had in his hands over and started heading for the front door when he noticed Auggie doing the same. "Bring the mail," he barked roughly. Eric watched Auggie run his hands over the table directly in front of the door and frown as he felt it empty.

"I need my cane," he said simply. Spotting it just to the left of the table, Eric gave a quick instruction to the sightless companion and as soon as Auggie had the aid in had, they both exited the front door. Auggie closed the sliding door quickly with a resonating _boom_ before beginning down the hall without a single word.

"Where are you going?" Eric's puzzled voice followed him down the hall.

"I need to check something out, but I don't trust any technology in that apartment." He navigated all the way to the end of the hall before pausing. "If you really want to help, I could use a pair of eyes. Are you coming or what?"

* * *

**_4800 miles away_**

A dark stranger hid from view in the seclusion of a spare room. A master at this game of hiding, if he wished to not be seen, he was not seen, and if he wished to remain hidden, he would never be found. It was simple as this: unless this man wanted to be known, he was invisible to every machine, person and view. He was a master at his own game, and it was both a game of cunning as it was danger.

The man's eyebrows were slightly furrowed as he studied the digital letters on the screen before him. He'd been at this new level of his game for over a month, waiting for a sign that his breadcrumbs were going through, but always finding empty replies and messages. _He_ wasn't hearing the call, and if he made it any more obvious, eventually _she_ would end up finding the trail of crumbs herself, and that would be ill-advised until she gave him the call.

Part of him knew something was going to happen soon. He'd been in contact with _her_ only thrice since her own identity fell off the face of the Earth with a falsified death certificate, but he was watching her operation closing, eyes planted everywhere around _her_ target, and he knew she was closing in. So he reached out to the other person on Earth he knew needed to know what she was doing even more so than himself.

The man prepared to close the small computer before him, ready to surrender to any thought of his messages going through when a message came in. The small icon hidden in the corner of his screen illuminated indicating a reply to his posting. A few clicks and a login later, and the reply he'd been waiting for the past six weeks finally revealed itself.

_Looking for one adult, female collie, up to date with vaccines, ready for adoption._

The translation was almost perfect, but the message was clear as could be: Auggie Anderson had heard his call.

The man only hoped his mission could run its course now. With one last reply and a twinkle in his dark eye, the man closed the computer and slid it back into its black sleeve. In the silence of the night he slipped through the open window, leaving that spare room like he'd never been there at all.

_One female in the litter, not yet ready for adoption, dark chocolate coloring, awaiting veterinary update. Standby for adoption details._

Back to the capital of the United States, Auggie Anderson froze in his spot. Oversized phones over his ears, and eerie blue light casting shadows in the empty room, he felt his entire body freeze over. His heart pounded like thunder in his chest, blood froze deep in his veins, blind, sightless eyes glazed over, mouth sandpaper dry, words curdled thick in his throat and his head went light as the words in his ear spelled out a message he'd never expected to hear again. Everything around him disappeared as his mind roared like a tsunami over the news.

"Auggie?" Eric Barber's unheard voice spoke up startled as he watched the other man almost sway under the pressure of the words he hadn't yet heard himself. Clueless to the situation before him and the hidden lines between the strange posting, he watched with wide and alert eyes as all the color drained from his superior's skin.

_"She's alive," _the words barely escaped the blind man's lips. Eric's alarm erupted in his expression clear as day, but it did little to ease his nerves over his friend's sudden glacial appearance. Auggie looked like he was about to crumble to the floor before him, and Eric didn't wait another moment to stand abruptly in case the smaller man fell.

"Who's alive, Auggie? What is going on?" His fuzzy voice didn't even penetrate Auggie's mute mind. He could only process four words at that moment, four words he'd dreamed and hoped and prayed more than he ever imagined he would for and _knew_ he'd never hear or believe again.

_Annie Walker is alive._

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Leave me your thoughts and a lovely review. It fuels my writing. ;)

- Liz


	3. Part III

**Part III**

**Location: unknown**

A dark brunette woman sat at a bar, dark waves of fallen curls pulled back loosely behind her head, smoky eyes accentuating the fake blue hue of her eyes, pale peach gloss skimming her lips to a perfect plumpness, a dusting of different shades of pink and nude emphasizing aspects of her facial features that gave her an entirely different face. Her fitted red top left little to the imagination with a plunge down the front of her chest that highlighted the two swells held up by a good push up bra, and her short skirt was barely long enough to be considered clothing at all. She looked and played the part of a streetwalker, and very few new better. This time tomorrow she would have a different name and a different occupation. Tonight, however, she had a target in mind, so she crossed her legs to show off those killer stilettos and invite-only outfit and waited for her prey to arrive.

Within half an hour, the man walked in, navy blue suit of a luxurious quality, crisp white top and plaid tie that all but screamed the net worth of his fat pocket. This was a town so small, it wasn't even on the map. People here turned to dealing, smuggling, robbery and prostitution just to survive, and yet this man that dominated the gaze of all in this shabby bar becoming a jackpot bag of gold nearly overnight. The same night that _Henry Wilcox_ was in town.

The sultry woman glanced down for a moment upon watching a blonde already attempt to claim her ground with the rich man. She knew the blonde, she had two kids and her husband died attempting to smuggle goods across the border, and her youngest child was ill three hundred days out of the year, so she decided to undo another button of her blouse. She was already thankful for the lacy black bra she'd picked off a lingerie shop across town the other day. When she'd touched the garment, it brought back memories and fantasies of another man with sensitive fingertips and a taste for texture skimming her body with his sweet touch, and in turn it pulled at her heart and made her breathe deeply like the thought alone was suffocating her. She missed him, _immensely._ She missed the sound of his voice, that messy half-curled mop of brown hair early in the morning, those sightless warm eyes that made her melt into his arms, and his strong and heated fingers when he touched her, even just innocently. She would die a thousand times to have him again, to be with him again, kiss him again, feel him again, _taste him_ again...but putting her longing heart aside, this lacy black article that reminded her so dearly of the hole in her heart was fitting the bill perfectly tonight as well.

With one last deep breath and a meticulously manufactured smile, the brunette stood and took five long strides across the room to the man, every step highlighting her curves and smooth, pale skin. This was a mission, and it was no time to let a real streetwalker take her opportunity. She'd make it up to the unfortunate blonde at a later date.

Right now, this night, she had a mission to fulfill, and each step she took to find the missing pieces of this intricate puzzle of Henry Wilcox was a step closer to bringing back those fantasies and memories that haunted her at night.

"Mr. Dellis, I've heard _so_ much about you," she let the words laced in a manufactured accent slip off her tongue like a warm liquor that made the man in the suit want to purr in response. His dark eyes met hers with a sickening smile. She kept up her invitation smile as he silently scanned her body, sliding from her overdone makeup to the deep crevice between her breasts and that lacy, black bra, all the way down to her endless expanse of naked legs in sharp-as-nail stiletto heels. His hungry gaze could easily make the brunette's skin crawl and knock the faux dark dye straight out of her naturally blonde curls.

But she kept up the charade, and with one silver-polished fingernail, toyed playfully and seductively with the trim of his collar.

"I heard from a friend that you are always looking for romantic company," she purred seductively into his ear, reading every reaction, expression, and body motion the man made so she could properly adjust her bait tactic. She did not need much adjusting at all, however; it was painfully obvious to the well-trained professional that this man was already well entangled in her net.

The rich man's sickening smile spread wider, showing a rotten tooth that gave away his pre-Wilcox lifestyle. "You're friends speak well, but my accompaniment is...highly demanding."

The brunette broke out her deal-making grin and leaned in close enough to the man that the exposed skin of her chest pressed against his crisp, white shirt as she whispered into his ear. "Its a good thing I am how you say...eager to please?"

* * *

**30,000 feet in the air**

There was a buzzing deep inside Auggie Anderson's ears that hadn't quit since he began piecing together this complex puzzle he never even knew was in front of him.

_Annie Walker is alive._

_His_ Annie was not in a pile of ashes that were thrown into the Atlantic, _she was alive._ She was alive, presumably well, and it left a buzzing in his ears that no matter how hard he attempted to dislodge, he couldn't shake. He was...fuzzy. He was off, and he did not understand why. Was he angry? Was he happy? Was he indifferent? He was definitely not indifferent, but he couldn't piece together all the emotions and all of the thoughts racing through his head and exploding like a never-ending fireworks show.

Half of him _wanted_ her the way the stereotypical male _always _wanted a woman's company. He longed for her touch, and her skin, her smell, her taste, and the electricity she ignited inside of him. He longed to hold her in his arms, kiss her with his lips, and let himself drown in the glory that was her mind, body, and soul. He _needed_ her mind, the way she knew him better than he knew himself, they way they could have entire conversations without a spoken word, the way a touch or a sound could change everything for better or worse. _He missed her._

The other half of him however, wanted to scream, shout, yell and bellow at her until he could make her feel _exactly_ how much pain she'd put him through in the past six months. He wasn't entirely sure how at this point, but he _needed_ her to know what the past six months thinking she was dead had done to him and destroyed in mind, home, and workplace. He was not simply upset that she feigned death even to him, he was absolutely _furious._

The seesaw of emotions had been playing their balancing act every minute of the past fourteen hours since he'd heard the news, promptly got Barber to order him the next flight out of the country, and promptly boarded a flight to a destination he wasn't quite sure he remembered with a plan he hadn't quite devised yet.

_Annie Walker is alive._

"August Anderson?" a voice broke his turbulent thoughts. Auggie shifted his attention to the voice originating just from his left. "You have an emergency call. If you would follow me I can take you to the telephone."

The man seated in 12C frowned. Lost in his thoughts and subconscious process, he was not paying attention to the surroundings. His senses felt dull after so much time left unused; it took him a moment to take in everything around him.

He was still in the air, he hadn't heard anyone announce a descent, and the humming in his ears that resonated low behind the insistent buzzing only confirmed these observations. Someone was snoring next to him, and judging by the giggling he faintly made out there was a family seated behind him...at least two kids, one probably below the age of ten and another older but not yet at the teenage status.

"Are you Mr. Anderson?" The polite stewardess asked when Auggie didn't reply. Auggie didn't even reply verbally with more than a mumbled sound. "There's an emergency call for you. If you'd like to come with me, I can take you to the phone."

Auggie raised an eyebrow at the announcement, but nonetheless stood and allowed the young stewardess to guide him towards the back of the plane. When he arrived to the area, another person whom he presumed was also a stewardess was waiting with a phone in hand that was immediately pushed into his the moment he was close enough.

"Where are you?" A familiar voice sounded on the phone the moment he raised it to his ear.

"Hollman," he recited back almost robotically. He had specifically told Barber to keep both his whereabouts and sudden developments in a six-month-old event to himself.

"Where are you?" He repeated again, this time more urgently. Auggie ignored the question, and before the tech op had an opportunity to repeat the interrogation a third time, he heard a different voice arguing in the background, followed by a fumbling of buttons and eruption of Eric Barber's distinctive voice.

"Just tell me you're still on the plane." He wasn't asking, but he didn't have to either.

"I'm still on the plane," Auggie recited truthfully. An audible sigh of relief emanated from the other line, but it did little for reassurance and more towards raising the blind man's curiosity and brow.

"If you have news to report to me Eric, do it quickly." Auggie Anderson's irritation was as obvious as his determination.

There was a pause of silence, and in his head Auggie could almost imagine the two other tech ops back at Langley exchanging glances lost to him,

"Barber!" He barked before he finally got an answer.

"Two of Henry Wilcox's informants have just been listed as missing, a third's body just washed up the Indian coast, and last night one of his partners stationed in the southern European region named Alexandre Dellis is not responding to any form of contact. Langley has just shipped out two operatives in a rescue mission to find Dellis and if they find you, man, I don't think even Joan will be able to cover for you. You need to report your location before Wilcox waltzes in here and demands to know what affiliation you have with these new disappearances."

"Are you shitting me?" He felt the aggravated heat of anger bubble inside of himself. "How long as this been going on? Who else is missing?"

"Umm…" Barber grew silent for a moment and Auggie wanted to close his eyes and hit his head back roughly until all the chaos around him cleared. _Was he completely oblivious to the world around him these past six months? _"Why, _the hell_ have I _never _heard about this before?"

"Man, we tried, but you haven't been very responsive since Annie died…"

Auggie was silent, processing the information. Someone he loved dearly had told him a while back that he was an optimist, determined to find the good in people until they proved otherwise. After that same woman presumably died, gunned down by a superior of his, he found it difficult to ever trust anyone or see any good in any person or situation. With this new outlook on life, he also found it difficult to ever take any coincidences for granted.

As such, what was the possibility of his discovering one of the CIA's best operatives and Henry Wilcox's worst enemy was alive and loose in the same general area of all these disappearances being simply a coincidence?

"Auggie?"

He _knew_ what this meant. His mind was in a haze and his body felt numb but he could decipher this news easily enough. He _knew _who was working here, and it was another corner piece to this puzzle he was attempting to assemble. Annie Walker was not simply _alive,_ she was working down Henry Wilcox from the inside out.

"Auggie!" Barber's voiced yelled once more, but the man was in no mood to answer questions.

"Where was Dellis last seen?"

Eric Barber was silent for a second, but Auggie's fine-tuned ears tuned out the insistent buzzing long enough to make out raced typing in the background before his colleague's voice returned. He was seen three days ago in a tiny city off the Bulgaria-Macedonia border. I can send you more specifics but there is no way of saying if that was his last location or just official spotting, man. You need to come back here, _today._"

"Anderson, report!" This time the voice belonged to neither of the tech ops, but the blind spy had already abandoned the phone and was halfway down the plane's cabin to find a stewardess flirty enough to let a poor, blind man with a sexy smile coax her into getting him to a particularly secluded town to the southeast of their final flight destination. A year ago who could charm his way into just about any destination or woman's bed, he was about to oil up those rusty skills and bring back the last woman he wanted to ever share a bed with.

"I'm sorry sir, we are preparing to descend and you need to get back to your seat." A young, American, and female voice interrupted him before he could reach the end. A wide, carefully planned smile spread his lips in a way he knew oh-too-well worked wonders with the opposite sex.

"Oh, my bad, I must have taken a wrong turn and missed my seat, could you help me find it?" He listened carefully, never letting the smile in his flirty lips fall as he felt the young woman taking his offered arm as she began walking him to his appropriate row.

In this game of prey and spy, Auggie Anderson was not to be underestimated.

"Actually, you are _exactly_ who I was looking for. You know, I was supposed to meet a friend at the airport, but I just discovered he missed his flight. I could really use some accompaniment when we land." He listened closely and felt a sense of accomplishment when the young voice practically giggled in his hands.

"You wouldn't happen to be traveling south, would you?" he practically whispered out the words.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

So I need to start off this really quick author's note by giving a thousand thanks to paixnouvelle who pretty much is always ready to give me ideas for my next chapter/part whenever I hit a snag. I've also just started a new job working with kids - which means by the end of my first week I had a black eye, bruised nose, and a horrible, horrible, headcold. (But hey, it gave me a lot of time to work on this fic, right?)

Let me know what you think about Parts II and III, and what you would like to see in the next few parts before I finish this fic. I know I originally said it would be 3 parts, but then I not only got an immensely positive response, but this monster kind of grew a life of its own as well, so we will just have to see what happens. ;)

Also, my geography is horrible and I had to actually do some research here to find random locations to send Annie. By the way, did everyone understand who the stranger from Part II was? ;)

Leave me some love and reviews!

- Liz


	4. Part IV

**Part IV**

_Dellis was last seen on the east side of the city with a prostitute, headed north._

"I need a favor," behind dark glasses the man spoke into the phone the moment he heard an answer.

"Man, its four in the morning," the man on the line croaked roughly. Auggie know he should have felt guilty about his abrupt call, but whether or not he had forgotten his braille watch back in DC, he was in _this_ too deep already to think much about it. "And do you have any idea how much we're already covering for you?"

Auggie breathed in deeply. He knew too well this mission he'd set out on by himself was stupid and risky on its best day, but that message he'd received, the proof that Annie _was_ out there somewhere, alive, it made all the risk worth it. "You _know_ why I'm here Eric. Its not just for me."

The man on the other line sighed heavily, and Auggie sprouted the first genuine smile in over six months at the success. "I need you to get me a photo of Annie, but change her hair to a dark brown, maybe a few variations of it."

"How do you know she's brunette?"

Auggie didn't answer. "Also I need you to ship that package I left with you to the exact destination I left you instructions for."

"Any chance you'll be able to tell me where exactly this package is going or where _you_ are_?_"

"Just email me those pictures as soon as you can. I'll keep you updated…"

"Auggie," Barber's voice cut him off before he was finished. Both men and both ends of the conversation went quiet for a moment. "How long were you with her before this happened?"

The blind man didn't want to answer the question, but he knew in the tone of which it was delivered this wasn't a question of one colleague asking another. This was one friend trying to help another, and despite the bubbling rot that seemed to constantly be growing in his chest these past six months, he knew this was a bridge he needed, not one he was ready to burn down.

"What if she doesn't want to be found?" The DC-based tech op asked again, this time successfully catching the other man by surprise.

_What if she doesn't want to be found?_ That question echoed deep inside his head and he felt it reverberate off his bones and veins, leaving his body in a strange sensation of numbness. What _if_ she didn't want him to find her? What if every time he got closer to her, she was purposely sabotaging his efforts to avoid being found? What if when or if he _did _find her one day, in a way he wouldn't stop at even Earth's end to do, she rejected him?

"Then I need to get a message to her that she needs to find _me."_

_"Fine,"_ the DC based man finally gave in with a hint of pity. Ordinarily Auggie Anderson would reject even any hint of the word, but he was past the point of pushing away pity or help. If he was going to bring back the woman he thought dead for half a year, he was going to use any and all aid thrown his way. He could fix his ego later.

"Just promise me something, man," Eric added one last time before his blind friend had a chance to drop a call. Faintly in the background, a low 'ding' announced the arrival of Auggie's requested images. "Find her, bring her back, and marry her so I can get the whole story one day."

Auggie didn't even reply to the request before closing the phone, but the sly look that passed his expression for a moment made obvious that he'd heard, and at least partially appreciated the request.

Auggie heard someone approach his table then and place what he assumed was a bill on his table, so he called them out before they had a chance to walk away.

"Excuse me," his voice carried evenly and loudly enough to attract the attention of anyone who understood any English in the area. "English?" He asked loudly again and hoping he had at least gotten the attention of the waitress who had previously served him. He wasn't fluent in the medley of languages he was picking up in the area, but he knew enough bits and pieces to know this area bordered a town that was very low income, and where Alexandre Dellis had last been seen.

"I speak English very little," a small voice replied just to Auggie's right. Without hesitation, the blind man put on his charming smile as he attempted to face the small voice to the best of his ability.

"That's ok, I was just hoping you could help me a moment." He pulled the phone he had just prepared to slip back into his pocket out and flipped it open to his new message. He sincerely hoped Barber had only sent pictures and nothing else because his current phone was not well equipped for the visually impaired. "I'm looking for a woman," he spoke a little lower as he showed her the picture. He couldn't see it, but he listened to the silence of the woman and scrunching of her stiff apron fabric as she leaned into the image for better inspection. "She's thin, brown hair, I think she has brown eyes and she speaks more than language."

There was silence a moment more before the young woman finally frowned backing away.

"We not promote prostitutes here. If you looking for…"

Auggie cocked an eyebrow. _Her cover was a prostitute. _"No, no," he said quickly before the waitress had a chance to flea. "I'm not looking to hire, she's a friend, and she needs help. Please, I need to find her." He listened closely, trying to pinpoint the waitress response. He listened for an audible response, or footsteps as she walked away, but above the slight hum of the small square's population walking about, he couldn't hear anything. She was watching the picture again, trying to decide if there was a vague resemblance in the woman in the picture to a particular young girl she had met three days ago.

"I think I see her, but she very different," the young woman finally answered.

Auggie felt his heart jump into his throat. _She was here._ "How?" he was careful with his words while his mind was stumbling over his own thoughts.

"I...I think I see girl with blue eyes…" the young woman was quiet again, but her tone left Auggie leaning into her voice expecting the remainder of her sentence. "And she much thinner, but it look like her a little bit."

"Do you know where I can find her?" he responded with a calmness that masked the pounding of his heart.

"You go ask Malina, she would know. She working today, so if you wait, I get her." The man listened closely to the young woman's fading footsteps as she walked away leaving him alone and with only his thoughts and the light hum of the background to occupy him.

_She was here._ He could barely process the information. A week ago he was in a dark and deserted corner of his mind he'd only experienced after coming back from war with once less sense. Today, he was sitting in a town that the woman he loved and thought dead for six months had walked by only days ago. _He was getting closer._

Footsteps started coming closer, and Auggie Anderson brought out his charming smile instinctively. Just as the steps approached him however, he immediately noticed the feet were heavier and a much different pattern than the woman's with whom he had just been speaking. He opened his mouth to speak, sensing someone close when an arm roughly grabbed him just below the shoulder and he stumbled to hoist himself to his own feet in a hurry. Before he had the opportunity to question his forceful companion he felt something small and very distinctive pressed roughly into his ribs, and he remained silent as the other person pulled him roughly and at an uncomfortable speed down streets and corners that were lost to the sightless man.

* * *

**one week later**

Deep inside the dirty peeling walls of a motel, a woman attempted to cover her biggest internal scars and fears in the warm mist of a calcium-stained shower stall. She wished, even prayed in a way, that the hot stream could melt her down into goo thin enough to escape down the shower drain. It could not, however, and instead the only materials swirling down that grate was a mixture of mud, dirty, and fresh and dried blood that peeled away as she scrubbed her raw skin pink with a scratchy sponge. She wanted to cry, scream away the pain until her vocal cords were torn apart like broken guitar strings. She wanted to scrub away her raw skin until it peeled away like the old wallpaper and paint of this motel room. She wanted to fill the tub and just let herself drown in it...but it would be too easy, and she was getting closer.

_Closer._ What did _closer_ even entail? She was always _feeling_ closer to one destination or one goal and farther from the other. She thought she was _closer_ when she took out Dellis and then Silva last night...but it was all a setup. Dellis knew about as much information as the waitress three floors down, and the only thing he got her _closer_ to was Silva, who was a dead end on his own. He didn't speak, not even one bit of useful information, and the moment he had a chance, he put a bullet in his brain, leaving the faux brunette in a hotel room now saturated in a traitor's remains and a multitude of technology and documentation she could only scratch the surface of.

So now she was in this run-down, pay-by-the-hour motel with a stolen vehicle, stolen hard drive she couldn't access, and a cardboard box of paper that to her untrained eyes may as well be gibberish. She didn't feel _closer _at all. Now, she felt the opposite; she felt like she was taking one step forward to be pushed two steps back, and she only hoped she didn't back up off the edge of this plank she walked or she would be too _far_ to ever get back.

Back. She didn't want to go back, she _fantasized_ about going back. She fantasized about replacing this trashy motel room for a high-class hotel room in an exotic city banked by the beach. She fantasized about replacing the swirling pool of dry blood and filth building at the bottom of the cracked tub floor with the floral, fragrant smells and colors of exotic bath salts and soaps that filled the sticky air in warm aromas and swirled at the bottom of a white, porcelain tub. And that raw, red and purple gash cutting over her collarbone, she could fantasize that battle scar being replaced with an entirely different kind of bruise, one made with moans and kisses and sweet nothings whispered in her ears as _he_ let her melt into his hands. She _fantasized_ about him because that was the only thing keeping her together when she felt like every step closer was sending her two steps back and farther away from turning those fantasies into realities.

Wincing as she let the now cooling water run over the fresh and blistering gash over her collarbone, she finally turned off the faucet and gingerly stepped out of the stained shower tub. The hot and humid air of the bathroom fogged all the glass and cool metal around her as she wrapped a stiff towel around her bruised ribs and stepped towards the mirror. Wiping off the condensation built on the surface of the reflective glass, she frowned at the stranger that stared back at her. A year ago she lived and worked in the capital of the United States, wore a nice suit to work everyday, had a closet of first class shoes and dresses, purses and other frivolous, expensive goods, and she wore these things with pride and a little glee. This stranger that stared back at her however, with the dull brown dye coloring her hair, scrapes and bruises covering her skin, and pale, pasty skin that sunk under malnourished bones and thin muscles didn't even represent a fragment of the poised and beautiful woman she took for granted back then.

The nameless woman sighed heavily as she stared at her reflection when a sound caught her attention. Her vision snapped to the closed door of the bathroom, narrowing as all else around her faded, and all other sounds silenced except the strange noise that had caught her attention.

_Footsteps._

The dark-haired woman glanced to the corner of the room where her only personal bag, and concealed gun lay on a nonfunctional heater. Without even the wait of her footsteps breaking the silence of the room, she made her way to the bag and withdrew her only weapon. Poised with the gun aimed, she faced back at the door, listening to the footsteps a third time. She felt her heart rate slow, and the world blur as she aimed for the door, ready to attack her intruder. With a held breath and one strong kick, the door split on its closer as the force of her powerful kick blew it open on its rickety old hinges. Someone collapsed to the floor, a body dashed to the side of her aim, and she readied to pull the trigger of her weapon before the splinters settled when she froze in her spot in a way she _never_ did so professionally ready to take down an opponent.

Because it wasn't an opponent at all. In fact, she recognized the curls and scruffy unshaven face of the man before her.

"Teo?" Her scratchy voice rose out from the depths of her vocal cords in a strange mix between a whisper and a shout. The Latin man stared back at her with a similar expression on his face. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"The same thing you are," he replied back bluntly with big eyes and the characteristic Colombian accent. His eyes narrowed slightly as if a puzzle were being pieced together before his eyes as he connected the metaphorical dots of this woman's harsh appearance and the intel he'd gathered over the past week. "You're not dead."

Her facial expression didn't even falter. "As dead as you are," her reply was just as emotionless as the master spy before her. "I'm dark. I can count the number of people who know I'm still breathing in one had."

"Well you may need to recount that number," he replied much quieter this time. The woman didn't change any expression or physical feature at the response, but deep inside her sore body she felt a pull of fear tug at her soul. "You're boyfriend is looking for you, and he's getting close."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Ok, show of hands: how many of you thought this was Auggie barging in on her?

*evil laugh* Truth be told, the thought didn't even hit me until I was proofreading it and thought "Oh my God, they're going to think this is the big epic reunion and Annie's all battered and bruised and naked in a towel in some crappy motel room."

Come on, have a little more faith in me. ;) I promise, Annie and Auggie's reunion will be more expected, a little heartbreaking, and absolutely beautiful. Their reunion comes with promises, tears, anger, and finally the long waited for kiss that leaves them breathless. (And a phone call, which is personally one of my favorite parts.)

And if the reunion doesn't put a fireworks show to shame (like my most awesome review I got from a guest the other day) the epilogue will. I promise, the ending will make everything these two are suffering through worth it.

Oh, and random factoid: Google chrome kept changing "Teo" to "Toe" so I hope I caught all the changes, lol.

Please leave love and reviews!

- Liz


	5. Part V

**Part V**

**Location: Brazil**

The woman's entire body froze and her eyes went wide as her heart deep in her chest suddenly stopped with the single breath caught in her throat. "Auggie?" the single name burned through her tongue like a poison festering thickly in her heart. _Her Auggie._ "Auggie knows?"

Teo frowned, glancing around the room as if he didn't even notice the woman's obvious reaction. "So you really did not know."

"I…" her mouth was open but there were no words. "How does he know?"

The man checked the thin window hidden behind soiled, heavy curtains just beside the shocked woman. "I don't know, but I heard about Dellis and went to go see if it really was you and he was there, sitting at a restaurant with your picture asking a waitress if she knew you. One of my men intercepted him and cautioned him not to spread the name of prostitutes so fluidly in the daytime." The man's voice softened slightly upon further reading the changed face on the young woman. "He is determined and smart, if he heard about Silva, he will be here by tomorrow morning."

She closed her eyes for a moment as she processed the words. _He was looking for her._ The reality of the situation was...confusing. She couldn't decide if she was happy about this, hear swelling in the familiar warmth of excitement to see this man she missed so dearly and dreamed about when everything else around her was burning to the ground like the walls of hell. She couldn't decide if she was angry, fuming that someone must have snitched, that now this man she would die for, that in a way she _had _died for was risking everything, professionally, personally, and emotionally to come find her when she was like a putrid poison, slowly leaching away at everyone around her. And she couldn't decide if she was feeling a particular emotion she never admitted to growing acquainted with: _fear_. She couldn't decide if she was horribly, fully, completely scared and horrified at all the possibilities of what this new development in her very off-course plan could lead to. She feared it could lead demise in formats she couldn't stomach at the moment. She feared it would lead to her covert efforts being brought too far out of the shadows for Henry Wilcox to remain oblivious of any longer. She feared, that if or when he did find her or she found him, he wouldn't stay, he wouldn't forgive her, and he would burn away all those memories and fantasies that fueled her continuation through this hell shed put herself into. She knew this man she was so in love with would never accept unwanted aid or sacrifices for his own benefit, so she feared he would reject her for everything she ever did to keep him safe.

"Annie," Teo's voice broke her thoughts then and she slowly opened her eyes back to look at his searching gaze. There was a moment of silence between them, neither moving, neither speaking; yet a lot of information was being gathered by at least half of the party.

"I haven't heard that name in months," the admission came out watery and small under all the emotions swirling under her voice.

Teo Braga, known as the Puma to many, and wanted for years by many more was not a man of emotions. Six months ago when this woman in front of him did everything in her power to help however, he came to the realization that a master spy's relinquish of all emotive capabilities was an even bigger sacrifice than he had ever considered.

"You should get dressed," he finally spoke low in the room. His voice was still empty of all emotion, but deep below the surface he had more thoughts than he would admit to at the moment. Before the brunette woman could turn around, his eyes flashed over the nasty infection bubbling around the deep gash across her collarbone. "You need stitches for that."

The woman looked him back, her expression unmoving despite all her thoughts clouding her mind and very muddled emotions. Rather than speak, and betray her deeper thoughts, she silently turned in her spot to face the only other closed off space in the tiny motel room, and within the moment, disappeared behind the closed door of the bathroom.

* * *

**Location: Romania**

Auggie Anderson was lost. His head felt light, each small movement magnified to the spinning of the earth around him. His ears were ringing loudly, the shrill internal noise piercing through his skull, echoing deep inside his head and partially destroying the effectiveness of his primary sense. He couldn't focus much on it, every tiny, physical movement sending his head spinning like a top on the floor, his limbs felt heavy and gelatinous, unable to support themselves. Everything smelled...foul, but in a way he couldn't concentrate on, as if his body was rejecting all coherent thought process.

Noise. He heard noise out from the consistent ringing that his muddled mind could not process.

Pain. He felt pain deep in his bones, like a slow burning ache that was spreading across his body, in his veins, slowly saturating all his muscles and tissues until they all wanted to seize and bring him to the floor.

Smell. It smelled of something he was unable to distinguish. It may have smelled of rot, the kind of rot that grew from moisture building on cold stone and cement over time, left to germinate bodily remains and other organic matter into a garden of mildew and mold.

Taste. His mouth couldn't taste in its sandy, dry state. The skin of his lips split as he moved them, his tongue stuck and stretched in his mouth, chalky powder coating his taste.

_Drugs._ Deep within his delirious subconscious, he knew, however faintly, that this mismatch of sensations and numbness, loss of direction and total conscience was the handy work of some powerful and large quantities of illegal chemicals swirling through his blood and veins.

He had zero perception of time, yet time felt like years past. Had he been here a day? Two? A week? A month? His memories swirled and bled through his recognition like black drops of ink spread through his memory timeline, obscuring events. He couldn't remember what he remembered, and he couldn't think the thoughts he should think. What was the last thought he had? Was it the overbearing ache in his gut for sustenance? Was it strong grasps holding him down? Was it the needles pumping his system with chemicals and mixtures he would never be able to decipher himself? Was it the endless _drip…drip...drip _just above his head? The noise? The dizziness? Perhaps the echoing and the falling? The dull ache and tightness of an excruciating, swollen wrist?

The restaurant.

He remembered it vaguely, but it happened to float to the surface of his raging waters mind.

He was at that restaurant. He remembered sitting there, the chilly air biting at his exposed skin, but warm sun also making the weather bearable. He remembered the sounds, a cacophony of voices, shrieks, chortles, horns, ringings, sirens, and other city chatter and clatter. He was there for a reason. Why was he there?

_Annie_.

He remembered it now, and the moment her name floated to the top of his endless mind, every swirl and turn, spin and whirl slowed down.

_Annie._

He was at that restaurant with a photo of Annie he had one of his buddies back at Langley superimpose brunette hair onto because of the brown collie reference.

The waitress. He remembered her small voice, the way she greeted him with dignity but never came close; the way she listened and participated when he shared the photo, and then threw him back when she recognized a prostitute.

_Annie._

That was it. He'd found someone who recognized her. The waitress knew another woman who knew _his Annie_ and she was going to bring him to her. He remembered the sound of her shoes walking away, the pounding of his excited heart in his chest, the taste of his fantasies on his tongue at the thought of a reunion. He remembered waiting for just a moment before…

_The arm._

He remembered an arm pull him roughly, the metal tip of a gun between his ribs, the rough pull and shove through the city corners, the stumble as it lead downstairs, the step he missed, the fall on his twisted wrist, the crack of bone as he hit stone, the pounding on the left side of his face as he tasted earth, rock, and mildew, and the even rougher yank up and throw into a seat where he was restrained and pumped up with more drugs than he could accurately process.

Metal slammed against stone in a deafening onslaught to the blind man's over sensitized ears. He attempted to stand and his feet crumbled beneath his body weight just as someone...multiple someone's...collided with his body, painfully twisting his arms behind him and shoving him with a hard kick in his spine forward and out the door.

Now he was blind, left without functional hands, damaged hearing, and severely disoriented. If he didn't die from the dehydration alone, he didn't have much chance with the forthcoming interrogation or much more time left as a useless body in a cell.

He left his panting breaths take over the ringing and ruckus emanating inside his own skull and melt away his surroundings and pains to a delusion he built himself.

Annie. He could think of Annie. He could think of the soft, silky strands through his fingers, or the twisted, stringy strands when she just came out of the shower. He could think of her captivating smell, her light perfume, the subtle scent of manufactured citrus that blended in so beautifully with the smell of her own person. He could think about her skin, how soft in felt under his fingertips, the dips and grooves and swells and curves that made up his own personal roadmap to her body. He could almost remember the taste of her, the way she kissed him without any inhibition, the way her kiss was sweet and warm and tantalizing, and so intoxicating it could make his head spin.

A thunderous clatter of a door slamming against the wall just barely broke his thought.

He was never going to get to see her again. He figured he had came to this conclusion months ago when his denial faded away into the endless days of reassurance that her death was absolute and not feigned, yet somehow the thought resurfacing now felt more final than before.

Arms hoisted him up with impressive force, and he felt himself being pushed into a seated position, the faint reek of body odor and rotting leather in his nose did little more to derail his reminiscing.

He thought he was going to see her again, and that was what became the most difficult to swallow. That message that surfaced so suddenly from inside his own home, the message he had been so painfully oblivious too for however long it had been sitting there before Joan sent a babysitter to check in on him, was a moment of reawakening. And then he began piecing together this complex puzzle, and he could almost make out all the corner pieces being put together to form an image of this woman's plan and location. He had gotten so close, or so he thought, and now he had no hope left of finishing his own mission.

No one even knew where he was or what he was really doing except the one friend he swore to secrecy and perhaps the sender of that first call. There was no hope left.

Someone was speaking, perhaps it was a tongue he understood, but he gave it no attention. He would rather spend the rest of his life dreaming about _her_ than letting these men who were trying to find her themselves acquire any attention from him.

* * *

Back in the southern and western hemisphere, an obvious frown scratched the surface of silence that filled the room, only interrupted by clicking and ticking of keyboard keys on a dated-looking computer. From across the room in a defensive stance, the change in the brunette's facial expression peaked the supposedly dead man's interest, but he showed little physical clues to this matter. The nameless woman kept typing however, allowing for moments in between segments of typing to wait for responses from her connections. She had two people in the area in which she had tracked down Dellis. Originally she had made deals with them find Dellis, to get information on his recreational activities after learning that he spent much time in the area. In exchange for the eyes and ears, she did some research for the two individuals who were each searching for another. She knew still, that neither had learned they were both dealing business with a dead woman, nor that they were both doing so to find the other under secrecy.

Today however, one of the young women with whom she had met at a restaurant two weeks back was sending her very peculiar information.

"My source is telling me that a blind man was looking for me today," she said allowed to the man across the room who watched her attentively.

"He is sloppy," his rough remark bit more harshly than intended, but she barely paid any attention to the detail.

"He trying to pull me out of hiding or get my attention." She read the translated lines carefully just as a new set came in. "He had a picture of me," she remarked in a slight surprise. "Someone is definitely feeding him information."

"How does a blind man find a woman across the world, exactly?" the thick accent did little to hide the accusation in his voice.

"He's not a blind man, he's a spy who just happens to have been previously blinded. Half the assets we track for the CIA are nameless and faceless. We train to lead without our eyes, and you don't know Auggie." She paused for a moment, her eyes wanted to close for a moment, just reminiscing in the mention of his name. _Auggie._

The barely audible ding of her computer snapped back her attention. Her natural brown eyes skimmed the few sentences quickly before slowing just before the end in slight confusion, and even slighter building anxiety. "She says she was going to lead him to someone I was covering as an employee for, but when she headed back for the table she saw another man quickly pull him away."

Finally, Teo frowned, his expression the most obvious of the evening. "If he was taken, that's not good."

The brunette woman felt a lump building deep in her throat, constricting her breath, speeding heart rate and growing her body cold. He did not have to spell out the severity of the situation for her; she was quickly piecing it together herself.

"When was he last seen?"

She opened her mouth to reply when another message arrived in her digital inbox. Without an answer to the man, she immediately opened the message and froze.

She felt like she couldn't breathe. There were strong, invisible hands wrapped tightly around her throat, constricting tighter and tighter until she felt like her esophagus was being crushed by the sheer strength caused by her trying to swallow the massive lump in her throat. She couldn't breathe.

"Annie," the other man in the room called out in slight caution upon seeing her reaction. He's watched her on her computer for hours before this reaction had occurred. She'd sucked in a deep breath and it was the last one he'd heard from her. Her entire body froze in its position, her expression went wide, her eyes glazed over and watered, all the pigment in her skin drained completely like rain had washed it right out of her skin. He could not see the images or information on her screen, but with the look she had on her face now, he didn't need to.

"Annie," he called again, finally taking one tentative step forward. She didn't hear him, her ears deaf from the world around her, eyes blind of everything beside the images and information before her.

She'd been shot multiple times, stabbed on occasion, nearly been blown up by a car bomb, tortured in a Russian prison, and suffered so many other physical treatments she never imagined she'd find something more painful than she had already suffered prior. The single image in front of her however, one low quality, small dimension image in front of her, made everything else she'd ever felt seem like a paper cut in return. She wanted to cry, sob and scream and shout and yell into the night sky until _he_ could hear her halfway around the world. She wanted to switch places with _him_, let her body take the hits, let herself feel the physical torture, let herself be put in that earth grave and relieve him of his. _She couldn't breathe._

"Annie," Teo spoke much more forcefully this time.

She couldn't breathe, she knew it, but somehow she managed to choke out seven sorrowful words.

"He's dying, I need to get him."

Teo frowned openly, his disapproval obvious.

Without another word, she jumped out of her perch without even a wince as the fresh stitches across her collar stretched and pulled in the sudden jump. A phone, one of four she currently had in her possession seemed to only appear in her hands. Her voice was so fast and sharp, the man across the room could barely catch them as he watched the mad scene unfold.

Within moments, the woman had her essentials stowed away, and a plan in motion. She didn't ask the man to follow; she knew this would probably be the last time they crossed paths, and while she appreciated having another human being in her company that wasn't a target, she would spend the rest of her life in solitude to cross the earth faster.

Her plans were changing greatly, but she was beginning to realize she may not have found all the puzzle pieces after all, and perhaps even worse, she may not be the only one putting them together, and that was a danger even she had not factored in.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Ok, so this is one of the cases in which a crazy plot bunny attacked. Basically I needed a reason to get Annie clued in to Auggie's presence (aka, I needed Auggie to get sloppy with his searching) and then I needed another reason for an "almost reunion" and suprise moment that will happen in part 7 because there is a key moment there. Well, I was watching season 3 when Annie was in Russian prison...and then this aorable little plot bunny just jumped right into my lap saying "use me! use me! use me!" and what do you know, Auggie was taken captive and drugged because someone thinks he's related to all these guys that Annie's taking out in her slow attempt to take out Henry Wilcox.

Eeps.

I was not a fan of torturing Auggie, mainly cause its already been done in the show, and I don't ever like making Auggie weak. But I think the poor guy isn't in the right state of mind in this story anyway so hopefully it still works.

I'm evil. ;)

- Liz


	6. Part VI

**Part VI**

Auggie Anderson was losing.

He was losing the strength to put up his impenetrable wall to the physical torment and agony that was placed on him in the past 8 days of captivity.

He was losing the will to even want to any longer, and as he lay crippled on the floor with neither the strength to stand and search for the elusive water source at the end of the small space, nor the strength to crawl over to any space to lay his aching bones. He couldn't feel his hand anymore, the building tightness in his broken wrist stretching his skin and inner tissue so tightly, the numbing tingling masked all sensation in his entire hand now.

His breath was ragged, his lungs burning deep inside his chest, bringing each labored breath to send shockwaves of pain through his ribs and muscles around his chest.

His head fell to the side, sightless eyes blinking under the burning in his eyes, his dry lids sandpaper scraping on his eyes. He tried to gasp, dry mouth and throat inhaling stale air that burned in his throat.

His mind was muddled, the feelings and sounds, thoughts and sensations muddling in his brain like a blurred vision. Sounds around him lulled in the background, a cold feeling...a foul odor...faded away behind the feelings and sounds in his delusional mind.

In his mind, everything was _warm._

_She giggled lightly, her melodic voice filling the air into a beautiful song, bringing a wide, peaceful smile to his face. He felt his body take in a happy and deep breath of contentment. _Bliss._ This felt like bliss. _

_Warm, moist lips met his sensitive skin just along the side of his neck; the tender intimacy sending ripples and shivers over his skin, goose bumps erupting over his body. His breath sharpened over the sensation and another giggle erupted over the woman hovering over his body. The edges of her hair brushed over his naked torso, dancing a teasing and exotic dance over his skin as she hovered over his body and guided her lips slowly down to his chest. As she started peppering kisses and licks and sweet tastes over his skin, he swallowed thickly, feeling his pulse quicken at the warm rippling spreading over his nerves._

_His hands found her sides, her skin soft, warm, and molding under his fingers and hands, letting him almost melt into her. His fingers glided up, and she stopped her kisses to let out a shaky sigh as his hands skimmed over the soft skin and uneven topography of her ribs. A small groan escaped her lips and he smiled wider while his thumbs skimmed over a tender spot that made her breath catch just right. _

Faintly from the surface of his delusion, sounds were changing. The shrieking that had pierced his skull for seven days died, but his thoughts and mind so lost in the sweet dream, he didn't even notice or hear the air changing around him.

_He sat up abruptly, and almost instantaneously her lips connected with his, her taste in his mouth intoxicating, the smell of her hair and skin swirling in his senses, making him drunk and dizzy off her scent. She wanted to inhale him, her arms circling around his back, fingering digging into his muscles and expanse of skin along his spine. He pulled her closer, their bodies pressed together, skin sandwiched against another, warmth filling the other, their mouths never releasing, lost in the sweet taste of intimacy so missed._

_He felt her fingernails digging into his skin, and he finally released her mouth, letting his nose glide down her face until he could latch his hot lips to the smooth and soft skin of her neck._

_"Auggie."_

_Her voice sounded strange, distant and muffled like a yell from down a hall or from the other side of a wall, faint and distant, but in his ears he heard moan at the attack he placed on her neck._

_She gasped again, the sound heavenly and delicate stirring in his blood, and he took the opportunity to push both their bodies forward until they fell back into the blankets around them, now his body hovering over hers._

_She giggled again, and he could almost hear her smile spreading her lips._

_"I love you," she whispered into his mouth as they reattached. He opened his mouth and separated from hers for a moment to speak but felt a bubbling in his throat and a choke beginning in his throat._

The acidic, telltale smell of smoke began filling his nostrils.

_Her skin was so soft under his, his fingers brushed past her hair for a moment, silken strands sliding between his fingers as he tried to kiss her again._

A deep coughing started in his lungs and throat as the delusion began to fade. The air was getting thick, oxygen becoming scarce as he came to slightly.

Sounds strange and varied filled the space. Crashes and booms emanated from faraway places, the sound of crunching wood and shattering glass, and the heavy feet of trespassers filling the halls and rooms outside his cell.

The coughing shook his whole body, his scrapes and burns shredding against the sand and stone of the floor as his body shivered and shook with the choking sounds. He gasped deeply, struggling to pull in clean air, but his weak and damaged lungs fluttered painfully to breathe.

Something strange was coming about, he could feel it. Somewhere in his head he heard her giggles and moans in his ears, feel the softness of her skin against his, but it mixed with the cold suffocation around him in this space he was locked in. Something around him was off, sending off multiple red sirens he couldn't quite place.

And then there was a crash. Pulling him successfully from his delusion, the room echoed a thunderous boom from outside what he assumed was a metal door. His attention was caught, and even though he struggled to make sense of his surrounding, he did acknowledge it.

He coughed again, finally opening his eyes as a rumble of footsteps barely made a presence to his sensitive ears. His sightless eyes blinked vigorously, watering and fighting against the scratch of his dry and dirty eyes.

A pain deep in his chest flared with every gasp, choke, and cough, sending earthquake-like trembles through his body to his limbs, making his balance unstable as he attempted to stand, stumbled forward and fell to his hands and knees with a horrible crunch. The moment his swollen wrist twisted under the fresh fall the struggling man let out a blood-curdling gasp as he swallowed back the loud scream he was well trained to hold in. The blackness of his world went wide, every nerve in his body igniting in that moment in a lightning strike that ripped through his body in a fiery pain that made his heart rate erratically change and ragged, already struggle breath knock out of his lungs.

He heaved a pained breath buried under a shattering cough, everything inside of his chest crumpling like an avalanche of gravel falling into a spinning blender deep inside of his body.

A sharp sound broke the hum of background noise, but his distressed presence and more receptive ears caught it this time. _Gunshots._

He coughed again, salt rising in his throat, a sign of serious injury to his injured lungs and esophagus. With a sharp wince and teeth clenching so strongly his teeth seemed to crack loudly in his mouth, he pulled his broken left wrist to his chest, cradling it before him without ever letting out the managed, dirty breath in his throat. He was holding in his breath and another wheezing cough when finally the sounds outside exploded to the inside of his room.

A blast of frayed metal and wood splinters sent the only exit to Auggie Anderson's prison cell-like room blasting open with such a thunderous sound, it sent the ringing in his ears into shock. The blast was followed by an array of yelling and bellows that made no sense to the blind man's ears, and he held his mangled wrist tighter to his body, preparing himself for the onslaught of physical torture that was sure to come.

He heard multiple feet barrel through the small space, filling the area with arms and heavy, defensive footsteps, the sounds of the feet echoing in his head, mixing with memories and other perceptions of the commotion exploding around him. He could barely make sense of anything happening when suddenly someone grabbed him from under the arm, hoisting him up to his feet in a powerful pull that left his legs stumbling underneath his body. His lungs twisted in his chest, ready to release another powerful wave of coughing when a mask was thrust into his face, someone careful to adjust it over his nose and mouth at such a speed it left his drugged mind spinning wildly.

He tried to say something, tried to get the mumbled syllables out of his lips, but with the fresh oxygen starting to fill his nose and mouth, and the insistent pulsing in his arm just above the area numbed away by the shattered injury, nothing escaped his chapped and broken lips.

Someone shouted loudly, orders in languages he could barely understand, but in the midst of the words that muddled in his brain, he did register one translated word: _found_.

Another pair of strong arms grabbed for his bent and cradled arm but instead clutching his injured wrist which elicited a gargled scream of pain from the blind man. From within his blind eyes, Auggie Anderson saw an explosion of fiery white pain that clouded all other senses and thoughts as the heat and poisoned nerves raced through his veins, spreading their pain throughout his body.

The new set of arms readjusted to grasp his elbow and avoid contact with anything that caused him another wave of agony. Auggie stumbled on his feet as the men lifted him to stand, but he had no time to question anything as he was pulled quickly in one direction as they navigated him through halls and doorways of his surroundings.

With the fresh oxygen in his lungs and the white-hot pain still burning in his blood, Auggie's head grew light, the floor beneath him violently shifting in a wild spin, his senses fading and perception dulling, as everything just seemed to slowly fade away to nothing.

He vaguely remembered another wave of shouting, and the strange warmth of sunlight touching his skin. He barely registered being carried up into a small metallic space, and the boom of closing van doors. He hadn't the faintest memory of the hustle of hushed voices around him, and the mask being removed; a needle piercing his skin, as the world faded away into his endless blackness.

He only faintly remembered the voice calling out his name.

He faintly recognized _her _voice, and a with a smile but an unsuccessful attempt to pass the syllables of her name out, his mind drifted off into a strange peace he long desired.

* * *

**Location: unknown**

The brunette woman held her breath.

_One._

She was mentally counting down the seconds, minutes, and hours until she got that message she needed.

_Two._

Deep in her ears her heart was pounding wildly, the thump and boom of it deafening in her head, sending shockwaves of blast-like power to her eardrums, rendering her deaf to the world.

_Three._

The blood coursed through her veins, speedways of signals and hormones.

_Four._

Adrenaline ran high and dangerously through her blood, nerves sending electricity that fried her mind straight to its core.

_Five._

Her skin was frigid, turned to ice the same degree as her brutalized heart. The brunette woman could not breathe until she heard more news.

_Subject found._ The news alone had sent tsunami waves of joy and warmth radiating straight off her skin as she realized what these words meant.

The next moment she had received a picture and a status report that the established protocol would be followed and no more communication would be built until the rescue subject was returned to the safe house and given a proper medical evaluation.

With one click of her finger, the single image attached sent bile bubbling up from her stomach into her throat. The blood stains, dark and dirty smears and deadly green hue in the skin of the man in her photo made her stomach twist and pull in such a violent fashion, she felt the world collapsing in her gut.

But he was safe. His eyes were closed, and he was obviously unmoving, situated in a position that left him defenseless, but the particular individuals around him and the oxygen mask over his face told her _he was alive._

She finally released the breath of air she had held for the past several hours and it all spewed out in a struggling choke and wet, stinging tears. She closed her eyes, letting the choked breaths escape and refill her pained lungs and giving her spinning mind a moment to reboot.

He was alive, but the fashion in which her people had found him proved the horrifying news her ally had shared only a night prior. The truth was more obvious now than it had ever been before.

She knew this plan was sinking like a ship to the bottom of the ocean. Part of being a top operative was knowing when to break protocol and create a new plan of attack. If she wanted to keep her cover intact and remain the dead ex-CIA operative, she needed to get everyone who _knew_ she was alive and who was actively searching for her off the grid as well. She also needed help; particularly in the area she knew one particular individual excelled in.

She took a deep breath as she closed the computer. Without even exhaling, she fished the latest burner phone out of a pants pocket and dialed.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Hey guys, so sorry it took so long to update. Two jobs, drama and a birthday left me super busy this past week (including celebrating on Saturday which I'm not apologizing for. =P)

Hope this chapter is ok, I rushed it a bit, so I'd love to hear your feedback.

Always,

- Liz


	7. Part VII

**Part VII**

Everything was _fuzzy._ Not the kind of _fuzzy_ that textures the skin of a peach or a child's plush toy, but the kind of _fuzzy_ a drug-induced mind attempting to recreate sense of space or time experiences when that same drug is being slowly flushed from the body's system.

The first day was the most unclear. He could barely piece together the events that unfolded. He vaguely felt his surrounding change, being brought into a warm environment after 8 days in the moldy, cold captivity he'd been kept and drugged and tormented and tortured in. He couldn't make sense of all the different voices surrounding him. Did they sound male? Perhaps some were female? Or were they are female? He heard the voices around him, always chattering in hushed tones, urgent and demanding, but he couldn't make sense of the speech like it was an alien language to his muffled mind. He couldn't remember any smells, but something told him there was a metallic, salty taste in his mouth he couldn't quite pinpoint.

The second day was entirely focused on one feeling: _pain._ Excruciating, explosive, pain. The kind of pain one felt when badly formed bones were being broken again so they could be set properly. The kind of pain of a broken wrist being cut open and cleaned without any medication to numb the feeling in his body and mind. The kind of pain that became so extreme, like a heat radiating inside in your blood that boiled so hot, it all just blacked out in the end as one plateaued at the maximum pain-tolerance threshold. All he remembered of day two was pain and numbness, stretching skin, and the piercing slice of a knife, the sting of antiseptics on fresh wounds, and the crunch of breaking bone. All he remembered of day two was fuzzier than day one after being consumed completely with agonizing pain.

Day three was fuzzy again, but different in its own right. His mouth was metallic, the tale-tell sign of drugs being flushed in his body. He felt cold, shivering and shaking in the frigid air while his body sweat profusely in the overheating of his body as it fount infection and attempted to mend itself. He felt sticky and cold, stiff and hot all at the same time. The third day was fuzzy because he was consumed with the sensation of strong fever and drugs being cycled through his blood. The third day ended more strangely however, as needles were removed from his arm, water and food was introduced for the first time in days, and finally, after all this time, the blinding white pain of his wrist began to be subdued to a more dull ache. It only took one dose to pull him into a dreamless sleep.

The fourth day was not so much _fuzzy_ as it was _blurry._ Blurry was an adjective Auggie Anderson likely had not spoken, written, or even thought of since losing his sight, but as he woke that fourth day after being pulled from his hellish torture, it seemed fitting to the situation. The timeline of the day was blurry, even though he _knew_ what had happened, it just seemed to blur one hour with the next in a blurry passing of the day's 24 hours.

He woke up blurry, a strange, dull, numbing pound in his head like a subdued migraine that without whatever medication running through his body would have left him in bed all day. To his surprise however, he _did_ get up from bed. There was only one woman now. She did not speak English, and only a few words of German that they could communicate through. He ate some solid food, and drank some fresh water. He was given a bottle of painkillers, and he took one gratefully when the dull ache became too strong. He was informed in very few words that this was a safe house and protocol was that tomorrow he had to leave. He went to bed with blurry thoughts and a blurry array of sensations in his body.

The fifth day came around with a sharp, stabbing pain in his wrist. Auggie Anderson awoke to an empty room in an empty house. The kitchen was cleaned through, the house was silent, and not so much as a glass of water showed sign of life in the abandoned safe house. The only things left for the blind man was some money, a burner phone, the clothes on his back, and a collapsible cane.

With a groan and sharp intake of breath as he moved his pained arm, Auggie stood, put the items his only functional hand could find in his pockets and managed to find his way out of the house and into the city.

* * *

It was midday and several hours since Auggie Anderson had left the safe house behind and never turned back. Early in the morning his thoughts revolved around the pain in his bones and head, and attempting to physically navigate a city he didn't know he was in, in a country he was unaware of the name of.

Within an hour or so, however, he'd found a little shop where he bought a pastry for much too high a price, and a lot of information for none at all.

He knew now he was in Austria, and the name of the city, and that he was somewhere near the northwestern border of Austria and Germany. The city was a better class area than the little holes he had ventured into after his Intel on Dellis's disappearance, but shy of calling Barber or Hollman or Joan herself back in D.C., he had little information on how to track Annie down now or how to get home.

So he walked, down unknown streets, passing unknown strangers, into new unknown blocks and probably even cities until he found some information or conversation that could spark any ideas in his still slightly foggy mind. This venture lasted for hours, but eventually the sun rose too high that it was beginning to fall again, the pain in his wrist started magnifying again, and lack of water or sustenance in his stomach threatened to add insult to his multitude of recovering injuries. He was just passing a store that he believed to be higher end women's clothing when he heard his native language in a startling minimal accent being spoken as a woman translated a menu out loud. Finding his interest peaked, and feeling it really was time for another dose of whatever that bottle left for him contained, he gave in to his weaker necessities and made his way towards the voices and clatter of tableware and food serving.

Auggie was careful as he approached the sounds he was following, slowing his steps as his cane scanned the few feet before him until it finally found a solid and hard object in front of him. Reaching his good hand forward, he went to touch the obstruction when a voice piped up in German.

Hiding away all the discomfort he was sensing, the once masterful operative pulled back all of his tricks and manufactured a welcoming smile. He felt the skin in his face stretch slightly and knew he was likely wearing some still fairly unpleasing battle scars. Whether the older hostess noticed or not, however, she very politely asked him if he would like a table, and upon Auggie's out-of-practice German confirmation, offered to guide the injured blind man to a table outside rather than in, upon his request.

The older woman was polite as she lead him to a table and instructed him of the location of a glass of water, menu that would be obviously useless to him, and chair he wasted no time sinking his aching bones in. With some last polite chatter, she left him to his own, and glad for a moment of peace he let his mind wander a bit.

He tried to piece together the puzzle of the past week's events, but it was hard to do so with all the edges of his memories were so frayed and damaged from the physical and mental torment he'd endured. He only faintly remembered the rescue, being pulled down hallways and out the building and being pushed into a van before someone knocked him out finally and he woke up in that safe house.

His mind twitched slightly thinking it over. The hard facts were vague, but he distinctly remembered a thought that he had in that van, a _voice_ that made him think of _her_ voice, even though he was fairly certain it _wasn't_ her voice.

Auggie sighed heavily, and careful not so much as the shift weight in the area around his wrist and arm, reclined back in the heavy plastic seats as much as they allowed and rubbed his sightless eyes harshly with his free hand until he was certain they'd be red to the general public.

"Good afternoon, my name is Julia. May I take your order?" The words hit his ears unexpectedly in a strong German accent, but the fact that he was hearing English at all made his eyebrow twitch. Still, he did not give this information away freely, and instead put on the best smile he could manufacture, and was polite back to the much younger girl.

"Well Julia," he played up the charm despite the growing blackness in his gut. "I'd love something in the sandwich range, but it's the damndest thing-I can't even read a regular menu."

He motioned to his eyes for emphasis, and she went silent for a moment, as he was certain she was feeling three inches tall after noticing his disadvantage.

"How about you just pick your favorite sandwich from your menu and bring it to me?" He smiled again in her general direction and listened to the young woman stumble over vowels and her own feet as she scribbled down something slightly too strongly on her paper pad before her hasty footsteps faded away in the low rumble of mixed languages and voices around him.

He digested his surroundings while he awaited his meal. He knew from the mix of languages around him that this area had more of a tourist background than the surrounding areas he had visited. His close attention to the waitress's voice, step, and stance painted a mental image in his mind. She wasn't very tall, and by the lightness of her steps, in decent shape and early into her shift. Her voice was calm and nothing shy of ordinary business, yet none of this information answered the question as to _how_ his particular waitress had known instinctively to speak English to him when he had spoken near perfect German to the hostess who seated him and didn't carry the standard baggage of a traveling tourist on vacation.

On the subject of tourism, a thought bubbled to the surface of his slightly muddled mind now. He wasn't certain of the date anymore, but he was certain of one thing: his three weeks of vacation were over, and if he didn't contact Joan soon, she was going to send out a rescue mission, and somehow finding him in his current state didn't seem like the ideal situation.

He knew he was physically frowning now as he contemplated this developing situation. If he went home now, he would need to hide his determination to find Annie well under a cloak of the still grieving man who lost his love. If he did _not_ go home however, he would be left with an extended leave without any of the agency's resources to aid him in his covert mission. Even with the help from very few select few on the inside, he found it difficult to imagine tracking down Annie as easily as he had the first time.

Lost in his thoughts and inner monologue, Auggie Anderson sat stoic in his chair with too many thoughts in his mind to warrant enough energy to pay the outside world around him. He became so preoccupied in his thoughts that he did not even hear a different young waitress approach him suddenly to drop off his meal on a heavy plate.

The blind man flinched, not entirely shaken but merely surprised as the plate unexpectedly bumped against his forearm as the waitress placed it before him.

"Oh, thank you," he said the words slightly mumbled but loud enough that he should have had no problem hearing him. He found the sandwich in front of him quickly enough with the waitress's perfectly planned bump on the arm. He listened to her hasty but nearly silent footsteps gliding around him followed by the sound of his glass being refilled by the woman. He expected some form of auditory reply, waiting for a _"no problem" _or perhaps even a "is there anything else I can do for you?" somewhere in her rushed movement, but instead he listened to her footsteps step away and disappear from the range of his slightly still ringing ears without ever giving any spoken response.

Auggie frowned. Something was off. The sensors and skills he had fine-tuned during his CIA and army training were booting up and turning. The waitress had been careful to tap his arm when she delivered his meal, didn't speak a word, and someone _had_ to have informed his first waitress of his native tongue for her to know to speak English in her introduction.

"Is there anything else I can help you with?" The familiar voice of his first waitress followed the same light footsteps he had heard earlier when she took his order. His good hand was scanning the table for something unknown or invisible clues to something he hadn't yet pieced together.

"Yes," he spoke more quickly than intended. "Another waitress, a woman," he tried to calm his voice and not give away any urgency or unnecessary emotion. "She just delivered my meal and I was hoping to ask her a question. Can you get her for me?" He tried not to give away any ulterior motive aside from innocent curiosity, but deep inside he felt his pulse quicken and skin grow hot in the cool air.

"Oh," he could hear her puzzlement in her voice. "Well I can look, let me see if she is still here." With her last words, Auggie smiled as simple of a smile he could conjure until he listened to her footsteps walk away and immediately continued his tactile search of the table for something he had missed.

There was a glass at his 2 o'clock, a thin napkin he shook out and found empty to his 10 o'clock, and then the heavy plate directly in front of him. A visible frown shaped his handsome features. Without even really weighing the possibilities, he let his only good hand skim the rim of the untouched plate. A corner of plastic such as that of a small bag touched his fingers and his sightless eyes grew.

"Mr. Quinn?" The moment the name hit his ears the world seemed to stop spinning on its axis. The voice of the first waitress broke his thoughts just as he had hidden the unopened bag into his shirt. _Mr. Quinn?_

"Um," the waitress sounded flustered as she approached him. "I don't know who the other waitress you mentioned was, but a woman just gave me a note to give to a Mr. Quinn and motioned towards you."

Deep in his chest, Auggie Anderson's heart was silent, the blood stopped in their position in his veins, breath caught in his throat, entire body frozen in place. "What does it say?" the words stumbled right off his tongue.

He listened carefully to the crackle of a paper and swallowed thickly, never releasing that breath in his throat.

"She wrote," she paused before reading the note, obvious puzzlement lacing her words and actions. "_Mingus needs a vacation."_

He blinked.

The waitress shifted uncomfortably as she watched the statuesque man in front of her. She was trying to decide if he was bothered, worried, or simply startled but could not place his expression. "Um," she interjected the icy silence for a moment. "She told me her name was Amber…" she paused with another crackle of a paper. "Amber Truesdale."

Finally, after many inflated moments, that prolonged breath escaped his mouth, and he felt such a rush of emotion and sensation course through his blood and veins, he wasn't sure if he should laugh, cry, or even just shout. He abandoned all the instinctive human responses however and let only a sly smirk grace his lips.

"Yes, I know who she is after all."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Bet you weren't expecting an update 48 hours after one that took over a week to post, eh?

Actually I had all of part 7 so planned out (and half of it already written) by the time I finished 6 that it really only took about an hour to whip up.

The story is quickly coming to a close as part 8 is the FINAL part (not including the epilogue) so I would love now more than ever to get some feedback on what you think so far, what you like, dislike, whats working and isn't working, and especially how you think this story is finally coming together.

Lots of Love,

- Liz


	8. Part VIII

**Part VIII**

**Location: Isla Santa Cruz, Ecuador**

Two days since Auggie Anderson boarded a plane in Austria and landed halfway across the world in Isla Santa Cruz, one of the Galapagos Islands off the Ecuadorian coast, and the man was growing tense. The island was peaceful, slow since the island was out of tourist season, and the air was crisp and almost sweet to his sore body as he waited.

"¿Desean algo más?"* A waiter's voice interrupted his quiet sit as he listened closely to sway of tree branches and breeze over black volcanic sand just down from the restaurant he was currently enjoying a drink at.

"Sólo la cuenta, por favor."** Auggie smiled politely at the waiter as he cleared the table of his empty bottle and small plate before walking away to fetch the requested bill. He held a cold and near-empty glass in his hand, letting the cool glass turn slowly in his fingers. The waiter didn't take long to return with Auggie being the only customer at this midday afternoon, but Auggie was not in a hurry either, taking his time to sip the last of his bitter drink before finally allowing his drifting thoughts to guide him back to his hotel room.

The walk back was slow, the blind man taking his time to navigate up the small town's pathways to the hotel with only one good arm. It was difficult enough to navigate a foreign area on his own, take away one of his hands and he needed more care than he wanted to admit.

He mumbled polite pleasantries to those that passed and did the same, and greeted the staff that greeted him first as he entered the hotel. He had only been checked into his room for two days, paid with cash, yet everyone at the smaller hotel already seemed to know who _Mr. Quinn_ was, what room he was in, and how he liked his privacy. It was almost unnerving to the man, who had spent so many years covert in these situations, but he _did_ pick this area for a reason, and he held his doubts that anyone in the area would ever catch his old alias from a previous operation.

He climbed up the stairs with minimal effort, and continued down the hallway on autopilot. He unlocked the door with minimal problems considering his injuries, and stepped quietly inside. The room was quiet and serene, filled with the air of the large open windows, sounds of the water outside, and sunlight filtering through the room and lost to the sightless man.

He began crossing the main area's floor to the small table across the room and beside the open windows when a voice took him by surprise, despite his long wait for it to appear.

"Auggie." As soon as the voice hit his ears, his whole body changed. His movement froze immediately, eyes growing wide, heart racing in his chest, a whirl of flooding through his veins as his blood raced in his body. Auggie turned slowly in his spot, his sensitive ears picking up minute sounds around him of busybodies moving about, clattering and clamoring from down below the balcony, rustling of wind in the trees nearby, and if he listened close enough, the wonderful melody of the woman's breath so close to his, it made his pulse quicken even more. He'd felt like every day for those past six months he'd been holding his breath, waiting for something to happen, her voice to reappear, or his heart to suffocate and pull him out of this misery he'd been in. Auggie felt like every single second since that last time he'd heard her voice in his ear, he'd been holding his breath, and that moment, _this _moment, after hearing that voice he wasn't sure he ever would, he finally let out the air he'd much been needing.

"Annie..." The name dripped off his tongue, and before it even hit the ground, an explosion of emotions with the force of a volcano erupted inside the brunette woman, and without a second wasted, she rushed to the man she'd spent six months dreaming about and collided her body into his with such a force, they both nearly toppled over as she finally burst at the seams and let a long awaited for sob erupt from her mouth.

Auggie gasped a sharp intake of breath as she collided with his injured wrist, but he found himself so absorbed in the miraculous moment, the sweet moment he had been dreaming about for _so long_, he buried his gasp in a hold around her body so tight he wanted to feel her body melt into his. _She was here._

"I can't believe you're here," her breath choked in her throat as she let the tears fall freely from her eyes. "I thought I wasn't going to get to see you again at least for a year, and now you're here." She tightened her hold around his back, her arms clinging to the fabric of his shirt over his bruised back like it was a live vest and she was sinking in the middle of the ocean.

Auggie wanted to be angry; he wanted to scream, and yell, and shout at her everything she'd put him through, physically, mentally, and emotionally. The horrible ache that was erupting in his chest however, ten times more powerful than all the pain from all of his injuries combined, made the air think in his lungs, his mind hazy like overworked machinery, and instead of yelling, or screaming, or even pushing her away like the logical part of his mind commanded him to do, he tightened his one good arm around her back and buried his face in the crook of her neck, breathing in the scent and warmth of this woman he thought dead for six months. _She was here,_ and she stayed there, both of them simply standing in the middle of a dark and breezy room for seemed like hours, the sun outside crawling down slightly as they _inhaled_ the moment, neither one willing to release the other for fear they would lose the chance forever. It could have been some alcohol sewing the thoughts into his mind, but to Auggie's hypersensitive fours senses, this woman in his arms, _his Annie_, seemed different, but he didn't want to release his desperate hold on her, relinquish the feel of her thinner body under his hand or strangely textured hair pillowing his face, or wonderfully different but distinctive scent of _Annie Walker_ to find out what else about her was different because _she was here._

"I knew you'd understand my vacation note," her voice only surface what seemed like days later, tiny and low like it was fading with the sunlight into a warm glow that emanated from within her very core. She felt like for the past six months she had this horrible, ragging ache and soreness in her body, deep in her joints and bones of her skeleton, and being here now, having her thinner, darker, slightly bruised and battered body wrapped around _him_ was the ultimate drug, the ultimate comfort that seeped into all those aches and pains and made them all fade away into this warm comfort that made her think of a blanket and pillows, and soft luxuries foreign to her after six months running.

Another pregnant expanse of silence filled the air around them. Neither of the pair loosed their hold on the other, both seeming to absorb the essence of each other in through their holds. The air however began to chill, at least for Annie. She didn't notice it right from the off, so long in the overwhelming flood of emotions she experienced seeing him finally for the first time in half a year, in such a miserable state that somehow matched her feelings so perfectly. As they stood there longer, unspeaking and simply matching each other's breathing, she was beginning to feel coldness in the man's body, a coldness that hinted that the silence he was presenting to her wasn't a silence brought on by lack of words to properly express his emotion, but from a struggle that was wrestling inside his head.

"Did you ever believe I was truly gone?" She didn't even contemplate the severity of the first blow until the violent words escaped her mouth. His body stilled like a statue, hand around her back freezing the faint swirls and shapes it was drawing across the covered skin of her back. A silence grew between them, and when Annie opened her eyes that had been so peacefully closed while she let her body feel, hear, smell and taste him so close to her, she saw the underlying darkness that had plagued this man she loved for the past six months of her rogue mission. She swallowed thickly as the terrible realization settled in.

"I hurt you." Annie watched a mirrored thick and pained swallow catch in his throat. She watched the subtle wince as he tried to swallow back all the dark memories, the angry tears, and the searing pain that destroyed him the past six months he'd been without her, and in turn it made her heart fall into her toes. _He had_.

"I understand why you did what you did, Annie." His whisper was so low and devoid of any of the sweet warmth she knew to be his voice it made the air around her feel cold and empty.

"But you didn't figure it out right away." Her words were not a question. The pain in his sightless eyes was deadly obvious. _He was mourning._

"I went to your funeral, Annie," his voice finally rose, his hand separated from her skin and Annie watched him take a step back, the space between them thickening into something near impenetrable. "I went to your _fucking funeral_, Annie. And you're asking me if it _hurt?"_

"I listened to them put an empty coffin with your name on it in a ditch in front of me and tell me I was never going to get to see you again or kiss you again or even tell you how much I loved you because we never even got to go on a single, fucking, date. Do you even realize how much you mean to me? Do you even realize how much you _hurt_ me?"

"I had to sit there, alone, and listen to your sister cry and your family, and all these fake operatives who didn't even know you pretend to be your co-workers, Annie. I had to do all of it, and you couldn't give me even the slightest clue that this was all a setup?"

"I needed you to believe I was really gone so Henry would leave you alone, Auggie."

"That's a bullshit excuse, Annie, and you know it."

Annie closed her eyes for a moment and took in a deep and steady breath. She was trying to keep her composure, but this man in front of her was making it a mission in itself. Half of Annie Walker wanted a physical manifestation of all the words in her mind to slap this insufferable man in front of her until he made sense of the words she was trying to feed him. The other half of her, however, wanted little else than to bring him back to bed with her and spend the next six months making up for the past six she'd spent dying a little inside every night she knew she was hurting him.

"The plan was to fake my death for a few days to get Henry Wilcox's nose off my trail. Once I could see what he was up to, then I'd find some way to send you a message somehow, but when I really learned everything that I did, I couldn't risk contacting you anymore.

"You still _should_ have," he argued still as tough as stone.

"Auggie, just answer me this, please," she began evenly. "If you were in my shoes, finally had him believe you were eliminated as a threat and finally getting to his weak spot, learning all his secrets, and discovered he had people on the inside, ready to take out everyone you loved more than anything else in the world, including _me_, would you have done any differently?"

Auggie swallowed hard.

"Do you know how many moles he had on the inside just waiting to take you out, or Joan, or track down Danielle or anyone else I cared about if I got too close again?" Annie watched Auggie's expression closely as she continued revealing all the knowledge she had gained over the past half year and she let her voice soften as she progressed into the more tender details. "You told me more than once that you would do anything for me, and I knew, deep in my heart that you would die for me if the chance came along. Can you deny you wouldn't?"

Auggie's eyes closed slowly as his breath slowed to a deep inhale. "I would," he finally admitted and Annie finally felt her words breaking through.

"I couldn't let him hurt you Auggie. I couldn't let him hurt you, or Joan, or Danielle, or anyone else for me."

"Why did you wait so long?" His next question was almost pleading.

Her hands buried themselves in her own hair and she let her fingers dig into her scalp in frustration. She felt his stance wavering, but she also knew she was leaps and bounds away from reconciliation.

"You were there, weren't you?" His voice appeared out of the silence abruptly and her eyes snapped up to his. Those she knew well that he couldn't see anything out of them, there was an ever growing unnerving feeling from staring at his eyes that seemed to be too perfectly honed in on her. "You were there at that restaurant in Austria, and you called the rescue mission in Romania."

Her mouth opened slowly as she searched for the word, but after a moment of absence closed again without a break in silence. It was answer enough.

"Why was it so dangerous six months ago, and not anymore?"

Annie paused in her step, but again remained silent.

"You couldn't send me a single, fucking, message to tell me you were alive, that this was all a set up, that the past _six, long, months,_ I spent broken over you weren't necessary, but then a month ago it was ok to send a blatantly obvious code in the mail?" His face was red, burning under the growing and bubbling anger filling his blood and coursing through his veins. He seething in anger and frustration alike, trying to make sense of the chaos that she'd created for him that seemed so senseless the more he interpreted it.

"I'm still blind!" An angry yell finally erupted in obvious annoyance at her silence.

"I never sent you any messages until yesterday." Another fat moment of silence filled the space between them as the words were processed in their individual minds. "As far as I knew, you could have been marrying some other woman in Bermuda and I wouldn't have known any differently."

Annie watched Auggie take multiple powerful and angry breathes, but the silence he was giving her now told her from years of knowing him that he was processing and trying to cool down.

"Exactly what kind of messages did you get?" she pressed on after a moment.

If it were in his character to do so, Auggie would have swallowed thickly then. "You didn't send me paper flyers in my mail about a lost dog?"

"What the _hell _are you talking about?" the words blurted out of her mouth so abruptly, there was no hesitation in his mind to question her confusion.

And then it all made sense. The metaphorical light bulb all the cartoon displayed when he was a child, and the eureka moment books and storytellers dreamed and wrote about finally happened in front of Auggie Anderson's sightless gaze. "Who else knows you're alive, Annie?"

Her lips were pursed strongly and eyebrows deadly sharp, a look lost on the blind man but somehow seemed to make itself present in her voice as she spoke. "As of now, just you, Calder, Teo, and whoever you told, which by the looks of your past two week's itinerary is Barber and Hollman." She paused, thinking the question over again.

He didn't hesitate to make his thoughts clear. "And Eyal?" he stated it as a question, but they both knew it was a statement.

Finally, the same truth already deeply engrossed in Auggie Anderson's mind planted a seed in her mind too.

"That son of a bitch," she muttered loudly enough that Auggie caught it. It was proof enough for him. "I thought he was trying to make a pass at me with all his flirting and instead he called out my boyfriend."

"I take it he never intended to retire?" Auggie asked tentatively.

Sighing with a roll of her eyes, Annie's response was the same as usual. "You would know about as well as I do."

Auggie wanted to roll his eyes at the strangeness of this entire unfolding of truth before him. For some unknown reason, he had always _assumed_ that _she_ had something to do with those mailed messages Barber just happened to stumble on a few days prior. Now, however, it was all making sense. Still, something caught his attention.

"Teo's alive?"

Annie didn't hesitate this time. "He was the last time he showed up in my motel room in the middle of Brazil. He's the one who told me you were looking for me." She watched his responses carefully for any falter or sign of information he was holding back from her. "Apparently you weren't being very discreet and it got the attention of some of his people in the Belgium area."

A sound finally escaped Auggie's mouth that was a cross between a strangled laugh and a frustrated sigh. The sound was uneasy and still laced in a tinge of red and frustration, but as Annie glanced up to meet the now pacing man's eyes again, she felt her skin warm and the line spreading between his lips and curving just barely upward to just _barely_ a smile.

"I was there in the safe house when Teo's men were taking care of you," her voice came out low but it held a better strength than before. Auggie turned to her direction once more. There was an expression on his face that Annie couldn't quite place yet seemed to inherently understand. His body language was speaking a language only the two of them understood, and so, hesitantly, she muttered out the last half of her admission before she could even filter it. "I just needed to see you and know you were okay."

Without warning, Auggie finally moved, taking three long and speedy steps in her direction, his body colliding with hers in such a force she stumbled for a second. It was instantaneous. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and he found her mouth almost perfectly. Their mouths molded to one another, all of their shared and varying emotions seeming to erupt and explode and combust between them in the fiery depths of a force that was immeasurable.

They were suffocating, lost in the desire that was multiplying between them, bubbling to the top and dangerously close from over-filling. The heat was heavenly and so glorious; Annie wanted to die in his arms for the way it made her _sing._

He had missed her for _so long,_ he wanted to absorb her through his skin, kiss her and pull her closer and hold her tighter until their bodies fused together into one.

His pull on her body bumped against his injured wrist and Auggie finally broke the suffocating kiss to give out an uncomfortable wince.

Their breathing was heavy, their heart pounding deep in their chests and minds swirling in the heat of a long awaited reunion. Neither let go of the other, Annie's arms never loosening their grip around Auggie's back, and Auggie's hands never moving from her sides. They let another kiss pass, this time so slow and tender, it left a sweet taste on their lips as they parted only slightly and let their foreheads rest together.

"I missed you so much," Annie's voice finally whispered tenderly, and for the first time in months, a genuine, warm smile finally broke the surface of Auggie's face, from his mouth to his eyes. A sound halfway between a chuckle and a sigh escaped from Annie's voice.

"What are you thinking?" Auggie questioned her in a similar tone, and the softness of his voice, so unforgiving when she knew how hurt he was after everything that had transpired the past six months left an even wider smile on her face and swell in her rapid heart beat.

"I was thinking about something you told me during one of my ops involving the Chens."

Auggie smiled wider. She didn't tell him the line specifically, but somehow he knew exactly what she was talking about.

"We talked being married for years and still being so in love that words became useless. Do you realize, that we may already be at that point?"

A long, heavy breath escaped out Auggie's nose as he weighed the words, but there was also a sense of comfort in them.

"We found each other, met in the middle without ever saying a single word to each other. Our blind faith in each other did something even the best and the deadliest couldn't see, and it kills me that I hurt you. I had physical pains and nightmares every, single, day because I hurt you Auggie," she felt her eyes swelling, thick emotion that she hadn't felt in over six months all piling up at the edge of her eyes. "I will never forgive myself for the hurt I put you in, but I could also never regret it entirely because I'd never be able to live my life the same knowing my selfish love for you got you killed."

Annie heard Joan's unmistakable voice sound from the other end of the line, a tone of question in her voice as she called out his name.

"Joan," Auggie started with an empty voice completely devoid of any of the emotions running through him. "I think you were right." Joan's Reply came back much softer and slower this time. There was a subtle hint of care and worry in her skillfully chosen words. "I need some time to grieve, and I think I need that time to be spent away from the place that only reminds me of her." He let his voice almost crack for effect, but the look in his blind eyes revealed more than his manufactured words. "I want to take you up on your offer of an extended leave of absence." Joan's reply was only one last question.

"Put in my leave of absence. I think I need a year to just step away from all the memories of Annie Walker and get back on my feet so I can work under you again." Without another moment of delay, Auggie shut the old phone in his hand and released the long pent up breath he'd been holding, and before Annie couldn't even see what he was doing, he turned in his spot facing the ocean below their balcony and without a second of thought, tossed the device as far out into the ocean as possible. When he turned back to her, it took all of Annie Walker's restraint not to tackle him down in his spot for the glowing smile he had on his face.

"Before I finally came here, I mailed a gps-tracked phone that was bouncing off that line I was just on, to an island somewhere even I'm not sure about anymore. Right now, I'm somewhere in the east where I'm going to spend the next year getting over you and grieving properly. In a year, you are magically going to pop up at Langley, and when Joan calls me to tell me you are alive, I'll come back to work, we'll start dating publically, and a few months later we'll say we moved in together and pick up where everything left off and let the office rumors make themselves what they wish."

Annie smiled.

"So, where to Walker?"

* * *

**Translations:**

* "Can I get you anything else?"

** "Just the bill, please."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

And that, ladies (and probably few gents) is the ending to Six Months Dark!

Oh, just kidding. There's an epilogue. ;)

I am excited however that I got to technically finish the story before 4x11 premiered. To those of you who do not follow me on tumblr, this story was inspired by Auggie bringing up a vacation in the Galapagos to Annie in 4x10 at which I made a post on tumblr saying "Ok, someone now write me a fanfiction in which Annie goes dark, Auggie finds out she's alive and the two end up together in the Galapagos islands.

Later, I got a request to do a "going dark" fic in which Auggie didn't know Annie was alive and se was dark for 18 months before returning to Langley. Well, technically she's not planning to go back for another year, and the fic takes place 6 months in the future, so add that together and you get 18 months.

Now, to answer some questions:

Eyal was the one who sent Auggie the messages. Eyal and Auggie first referred to Annie as a "lost collie" (as in border collie, a dog breed) on a pet message board when Annie was taken in Russian prison.

Teo is alive in my fic because we never saw his body and he's such a master spy I have a hard time imagining a little leg injury got him killed. Teo has connections _everywhere_, and his connections set up a rescue group to get Auggie out of Romania. Annie flew in soon after to go check up on him, but its up to your interpretation to figure out whether or not her voice Auggie heard in that van that rescued him was real or a figment of his delusion.

Also, Annie was roaming around Europe and South America as a multitude of different aliases. She only used the name "Amber Truesdale" so that Auggie would know it was her, because if you don't recollect, that was Annie's fake name when she played as an escort in the pilot episode of the series (in which Auggie is her John, lol.) Mr. Quinn is from the season 3 episode in which Annie and Auggie go to Spain as Mr. and Mrs. Quinn for an op to get Red Rover.

In my mind I figured since Henry Wilcox has so many moles in the CIA and now has his own spy _thing_ going on, Annie would want to get to his strongest connections first before going in for Wilcox himself. Also, the entire "you need to take a leave" at the beginning of the fic now you can see was obviously planned so that Auggie would have an excuse to disappear for a year.

And with that, I think I answered most questions. If you need any others answered however, do not hesitate to ask either on a review or a pm, or if you follow my tumblr, in a message on tumblr.

Please comment, review and let me know what you think.

It's been so much fun.

- Liz


	9. Epilogue

**EPILOGUE**

* * *

Her light feet padded almost silently over the plush carpeting hugging her naked toes. In nothing more than a thin, white, men's dress shirt and dark panties, the faux-brunette smiled as she watched the only other human being in their secluded bungalow attentively focused on the oversized headphones over his ears and modified keyboard beneath his fingertips. As silently and lightly as she could muster, she tiptoed her way over to where the man sat typing away on his computer, and without giving him any indication that she was inches away, decided to plant a kiss on his neck.

The instant Auggie felt her warm lips on his skin he flinched in surprise but erupted in a smile that novels could rave about for decades. "Always the welcome distraction," he muttered smoothly in response.

"Hmmm…" she smiled as her lips moved slightly higher to just below his ear. She could feel his skin warming under her touch. "I was just admiring how enticing you looked over here all alone in this big bed, so focused on your computer and all the things I'd rather see you focused on." Her seductive words were almost a purr in his sensitive ears, and it made him want to swallow thickly. "What are you doing anyway? This is our last week in our private paradise and you're spending our makeshift vacation on a computer."

He smiled even wider. "Actually I was talking to Andrew Hollman from inside the DPD. They got an interesting package in the mail yesterday." He spoke the words with a mischievous smirk and Annie's eyebrow peaked in interest as her lips released his skin.

"Really?" She said almost surprised. She knew full well this had been the plan the two of them had worked out together, but she never anticipated for the department to process their delivery quite so quickly that she'd be hearing about it from the tech ops within 24 hours of delivery. "What did he say?"

"Not too many details, but it basically went something along the lines of a very strange flash drive was hand-delivered to the head of clandestine services yesterday morning, and by the time he was clocking out for the day, everyone's security clearance was changed for review. Everyone and anyone who ever worked personally with Henry Wilcox is under review with strict restrictions from coming within 500 yards of Langley walls, and they already arrested multiple individuals who fought to get him in his seat before you 'died'."

Annie couldn't resist the smile that stretched her face. It was over. After everything that man had put her through since Jai's death, it was finally over, and in eight day's time, she would be walking into Langley's front doors again, hopefully as a reinstated operative. It was finally over, and she felt like there was an ease in her chest as the weight of everything she'd fought through for the past two years was lifted.

"They're looking for him now," Auggie whispered this time.

Annie's smile fell slightly. "They'll never find him," she admitted in an equally low tone.

"I don't think they really intend too, and that's the important part." Auggie smiled in a way that made everything slow down for a moment. Feeling the strange foreign sensation of peace in her bones for the first time in two years, Annie silently moved the computer in front of her romantic partner's lap to the side, and gently removed his headphones from around his neck with a smile that matched his and told her it was acceptable to do so. Auggie felt her knee find the mattress on the other side of his lap and his hands instinctively reached out to around her waist as she straddled his lap, her arms around his neck in a playfully and yet loving manner.

"Have I actually told you enough times already how incredible you are?" Her voice was sultry and low, almost a purr.

He smirked. "The feeling is mutual." The smirk that graced his face almost seemed to glow a strange luminescence of pride in addition to something else the women in his lap couldn't quite put her finger on. Her hair, falling loosely around her shoulders tumbled behind her back in loose curls, the dark and dry brown dye fading and slowly blending into the warmer blonde tones underneath as her natural color began to finally get the chance to make a reappearance.

"A year ago I didn't know if I could do this in five years, let alone just under one," her warm voice softened so near his sensitive ears. Her thin fingers were unconsciously playing with the loose half curls that sprouted from the base of the back of his skull.

"I doubt I had much to do with that. I almost successfully derailed your entire mission in three days time, and then managed to almost get myself killed." As if to prove his point, he tightened and loosened a fist in his left hand, twisting his wrist slightly before letting his palms press back against her warm skin. The pale scars over his wrist and light one just along his brow were the only reminders now of all that had occurred those first few days and week that he had begun searching for her, and to his sightless eyes, even those were invisible now.

"No," she started simply. "Even Teo agreed before I found out you were out there. I needed someone with certain skills I didn't have and never needed before because I always had you." She watched Auggie's expression closely, and as the words sunk into his understanding his sexy smirk softened to something of mutual adoration and love. "Plus, I think I just needed a reminder that I wasn't alone in the world."

The smile Auggie Anderson wore remained strong, and further into the conversation his thumbs started fanning small circles and shapes along her skin in comfort. "One of these days or years, we need to find out how Teo ever even found out about me."

Annie smirked, and though the smile was lost to the blind man in her arms, it was almost like he just knew it was there and reciprocated with a widening of his own similar expression. "Well you know, on my first day at Langley, Joan told me if I was looking for clarity I was in the wrong line of work. I think there are always going to be more questions unanswered than information found."

Auggie didn't even hesitate to add on. "So long as you're with me, I can live with that."

Finally closing the small space between them, Annie let her mouth collide with his, arms tightening their hold on his neck to bring him closer, and his hands digging into her warm and soft skin of her sides as he pulled her closer himself.

It was the little moments like these, the small glimpses of peace and comfort and love and passion that made everything worth it. These moments were what made the past six months of his heartbreak worth it, and her six months of solitude worth it, and their six months of craving, crying, wanting and needing the other worth it. These moments were what made them remember why they were together in the first place, and as Annie pushed gently but strong enough on Auggie's chest until he let his body weight fall back into the pillows behind him before she reattached her hungry lips with his, she was remembering all those reasons just as well as he.

"Wait," he finally breathed in the haze of their heated moment. Their skin were getting hot, their very few layers of clothing were diminishing further, and as much as he hated to pause the moment his body was screaming at him to continue, he had another announcement to make, followed by a question.

"I told Joan that even if you come back to Langley, you didn't know yet if you were going to come back with the same name," Auggie's breathless and heavy voice spoke up. Annie sat up slightly, the open shirt around her otherwise naked torso lightly dragging across the naked skin of his chest as he breathed in heavily.

"I told you Auggie, I'm ok with resurrecting Annie Walker so I can get back to as normal a life as possible. The whole purpose of going dark was to get rid of Henry Wilcox. He's gone, I'm here with you, everything is back where it should be for the most part. I thought that's the life we decided we wanted to try?" She was perplexed by his initial announcement, but even more so by the strange expression that was on his face.

In his chest, Auggie felt like the pounding muscle pumping blood through his veins was just a few pumps away from pounding straight through his sternum and out of his body. He swallowed hard, not something he did often, holding back the nerves that crept up on him, an even more foreign sensation to the spy.

"That's not what I meant." Annie wasn't watching his hands until he had one up between them with something very small and very identifiable between them. Her breath caught in her throat as his fingers slowly popped open the small velvet box in his hands revealing the brilliant jewel within.

"Two years ago we talked about being married and in love for years, and I think somewhere along the way we skipped the ceremony and went straight into whatever that next step in a long-term relationship is."

Annie felt like the world had stopped spinning straight on its axis. He hadn't said it yet, but the realization of what was happening hit her like a meteorite, straight in the heart.

"I was hoping you might consider coming back as Annie Anderson."

He didn't have to ask, just as he didn't have to see the way her entire body just seemed to glow; he knew.

"Will you marry me?"

* * *

**. . . . .**

**THE END**

**. . . . .**

* * *

**Author's Note:**

*tear* Well, there you have it, the epilogue to Six Months Dark.

I really can not begin to describe how great it has been to write for you guys and see all your positive responses to every single update. Really, thank you. Special thanks to Epona3 for encouraging me to _write_ this fiction in the first place, paixnouvelle for all the time you helped me catch those pesky plot bunnies along the way (especially through parts 3-5) and Marie King for being my biggest supporter here!

I hope you all enjoyed the ending. The first time I started writing this fic it was going to end with chapter 8, then before I even finished chapter/part 1, I wrote an epilogue (I always write the ending first!) and before I knew it Auggie was proposing to Annie. I don't know, it just took on a life of its own, lol. (But you guys _should_ have had some hint since Barber _did_ tell Auggie to marry her in part III. ;)

Anyways, I'd love to see your thoughts on the very ending of Six Months Dark. Make sure to check out my other Covert Affairs fanfiction, **Timeline** and the sequel collection of oneshots, **Time Frame.**

Lots of Love,

- Liz


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